


pressed down, shaken together, running over

by RorschachIris



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Past Lives, Angst, Complete, Elements of Colin Trevorrow's script, Elements of Duel of the Fates, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Hugs all around, Kylo Ren is a Mess, Not Beta Read, Not Canon Compliant, Or a daydream rather, Rey (Star Wars) is a Mess, Rey Solana, but only in a dream - Freeform, everyone is a mess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-19
Updated: 2020-03-21
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:26:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 37,414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22797028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RorschachIris/pseuds/RorschachIris
Summary: Rey, a warehouse worker at a large company, finds something uncannily familiar about the new President, even though she's certain she's never met him before.Modern-day AU
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 42
Kudos: 154





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hoo, it's been a while since I've written anything, and certainly a while since I've written anything longer than 1 chapter... Also my first time posting on AO3, so that's cool! As a side note, if you have tips for posting on/navigating AO3, please let me know.
> 
> And now, please enjoy this unbetaed mess yaayy

Rey stomps her boots to free the treads of the remaining clumps of snow as she shrugs her well-worn winter coat from her shoulders and throws it over the back of her desk chair. It’s the dead of winter, and the silent, near-constant barrage of snow over the past few days has resulted in this morning’s thick blanket of tenuous perfection covering the gray, lifeless ugliness of the city, a blank slate lying in wait. It’s early in the morning, too early, and the long-absent sun, a distant white disc hung low in the pale, colorless sky, peers inquisitively between the ghostly buildings.

Nodding a greeting to her coworkers in the company warehouse, she plops into her deflated office chair with a sigh and types her credentials into her battered work computer. As it hums to wakefulness, she grabs her mug, peers into it, shrugs, and cuts her way across the warehouse to the break room down the hall.

As the hot water machine whirrs in consternation over the waiting tea bag in her mug, she leans restlessly against the one window and stares out of it, into the empty street that runs alongside the building, into the blank windows of the buildings across from her. She finds herself straining to see if there are windows in the opposite walls of those buildings, straining to see through those windows to what is beyond, straining and failing to find anything but lifeless walls and empty chairs and unlit lights.

\---

Ren stifles a yawn and chases it with a sip of freshly brewed coffee as he waits for the traffic light to change. He doesn’t usually arrive at the office this early, but as the newly-announced President of the company, he now has to preside over the monthly all-staff meetings. And his assistant somehow accidentally corrupted his entire slideshow file, the evening before the meeting. So.

Ren turns into the street by his company building and glances half-heartedly at its impassive outer shell, its rows of windows still lifeless.

He catches sight of someone standing in a window at the far end of the building, in the warehouse. A slight figure in the yellow office light, brown hair pulled back from her face, all knit sweater and slim fingers and distant eyes.

The sight is fleeting. Ren drives on and turns his car into the parking lot.

\---

“I heard they flew him in from Ahch-To just a day before they announced that he was the new President,” Finn murmurs in Rey’s ear as they file into the multi-purpose room that is currently serving as an auditorium.

“Yeah?” Rey replies, thinking back on her limited knowledge of Ahch-To. Lush greens and vibrant, clear blues pulsate momentarily in her mind; stony beaches and scrabbly, weedy hillsides. “I hear it’s a nice place.”

“It’s basically nowhere,” Finn scoffs. “Our smallest branch. Literally only ten employees out there. Why would they find someone there to be the next President?”

“Maybe he’s actually good at his job?” Rose snarks from behind them, waggling her eyebrows.

Finn rolls his eyes; Rey cracks a grin.

“What was his name again?” Rey asks. She has a distant, caricature-like impression of him from rumors in the office and from fleeting glimpses of his employee profile as it popped up on various occasions, but had never paid him much mind.

“Kylo Ren,” Rose answers promptly.

“Doesn’t even sound like a real name,” Finn footnotes, scoffing. “And the scar! Sketchy as hell.”

The CEO steps onto the stage and clears his throat. As stragglers wander in and search for seats in the back, he begins speaking.

“As you are all now aware, I’m sure, the board named a new President a few weeks ago. We will be working with various departments to ensure that the transition of the title and responsibilities will be smooth and non-disruptive to our daily functions.”

As Kenobi continues speaking, Rey cranes her neck a little, and catches sight of a figure with dark hair sitting alone in the front row of the auditorium. As she watches, and as Kenobi introduces him, he stands to his full, imposing height. He steps onto the stage and faces the crowd, and Rey, clapping politely along with the rest of the seated throng, sees that his face and features are long, his brow dark and taut, his mouth wide and startlingly full-lipped despite its stern expression. And as Finn mentioned, a scar runs down the right side of Ren’s face, most pronounced at the cheek and jaw, fading gradually as it cuts through the brow. Not so much sketchy to Rey as menacing. A vague sense of déjà vu twinges in the back of her mind.

The rest of the meeting is uneventful; Ren immediately dives into the slides and reviews some statistics over the past few months of operation, noting the relative initial success of a recent acquisition. Various other officers present their topics; work anniversaries are recognized; miscellaneous announcements are stuffed awkwardly into the end of the meeting. Beside her, Finn and Rose alternate between trading whispered comments and scrolling uninterestedly on their phones.

But Rey is absorbed in the jolt of familiarity at the sight of this stranger. She is certain, however, that she has never met this man before, never even seen him at a distance. She wonders if perhaps she saw someone similar in passing, at a store or on the street? Or perhaps in a dream? She racks her mind and comes up with nothing.

_Bring him back._ A voice—not even a voice—more of a thought, really—rises in her mind, unbidden.

She stares at Ren from across the room.

\---

After the all-staff meeting, Ren hangs back in the auditorium and watches as the crowd that had stuffed itself into the auditorium now flows back out into the rest of the building. Chatters, giggles, stares. Ren waits for it all to pass.

As the crowd rapidly thins, Ren sees trailing behind everyone else a young woman with brown hair swept back from her face and dark, distant eyes. He meets her eyes as she walks by. She holds his gaze for a moment, eyes unreadable, before slanting her eyes to the ground and hurrying on.

Ren does not permit himself to turn his head and watch her go. As he follows Kenobi to the administrative wing of the building, something in his mind flexes, awakened and unsettled.

He recognizes her. The girl standing in the window, from earlier that morning.

But it’s more than that, he realizes. Despite the fact that he’s never met her before, he’s certain that he _knows_ her.

\---

Rey dreams that night. She dreams of half-running, half-slipping across an endless desert, the sun burning her already-burnt skin, the dunes of sand shifting and reforming around her with every mighty gust of desert wind. The steel-blue sky above, offering no reprieve, rises impassively around her like the walls of a prison. She doesn’t know what she’s running from, or where she’s running to. She just knows that the monster behind her cannot catch her at any cost.

The dream shifts. She lies strapped to something—a chair? A hospital bed?—and she’s sucking in terrified breaths and trying, _trying_ to be brave. A figure stands in the shadows, impossibly tall and broad, cloaked in black, its face obscured. A swirl of emotions that she cannot describe, and will not remember in the morning, seize hold of her. She screams at it; it stands motionless, immune to her cries. Then it lifts its hands to its mask, and—

\---

The next morning, Ren takes the same route to work as the day before, and at the same time. As he pulls up by the building, his eyes steal to the lone lit window, and there she is again, dimly illuminated by the horrendous office light. Another sweater, another pair of jeans, but the same brown hair swept back carelessly, the same expression in her eyes.

Rey watches the black car with tinted windows as it passes by her window. It slows almost imperceptibly as it passes her, before continuing on to the parking lot.

\---

Ren stares at the link to the staff directory on the home page of his company’s internal website, contemplating whether this is a good idea at all. Logically, his feelings do not make any sense and should have no hold over his actions. He knows for a fact that he has never met her before. He doesn’t know the first thing about her, not even her name. The sense of familiarity, the yearning to reach out to her and close this gap between them, is not rooted in anything but a fleeting interest, an inexplicable flash of something entirely whimsical, superficial, even foolish. And if anyone found out that he had used the company’s internal website to stalk another employee…well, that was certainly not a scandal he needed on his plate.

He sighs. Clicks on the directory link. Searches for the warehouse supervisor. Scrolls through the supervisor’s list of team members.

And there she is, the only woman among the warehouse staff. Still fairly new. Fresh-faced, with a straightforward, guileless gaze, and—he now notices—a handful of freckles scattered across her suntanned nose and cheeks.

He scrolls down a bit further, and sees that all of the personal information fields on her profile are empty.

\---

Rey manages to put Kylo Ren out of her mind for the remainder of the day. She focuses on inventory, on preparations for a meeting with a customer, on research for negotiating with a new vendor. She moves boxes and crates and all manner of wares about, navigating around the clutter and the ceiling-high shelves, and scoots up and down ladders to check shipments. She loses herself in the comforting mundaneness of it all, as she does every day.

As she drives home in the evening (and she can’t help, when she’s walking into the parking lot, to scan the lot for the black car with tinted windows), the city receding behind the trees and low-lying buildings of the surrounding suburbia, she makes a quick stop at a grocery store. She needs something for a passable dinner, and more cat food for BB8.

As she contemplates pasta sauces— _how can there be so much variety for such a simple thing?_ —she is distantly aware of someone coming down the aisle behind her, and automatically steps out of the way. She reaches for the chunky variety, with vegetables, onions, garlic—and stops. Glances at the person who is now stopped behind her.

Her gaze travels up an expensive-looking black coat, broad shoulders, and meets Ren’s eyes. He has a shopping basket in hand, and he's paused on his way down the aisle to double take at her over his shoulder. The slant of his shoulder and the high collar of his coat cover his mouth, and all she gets is this hooded, impenetrable gaze from under a tense brow and a shock of wavy black hair. A veritable Hades, towering above her, simultaneously attractive and repulsive, ready to escort her to her death.

Quelling a shiver, Rey slowly picks up a jar of tomato sauce—and she’s suddenly self-conscious of her food choices; did she really have to pick something as unhealthy and mundane as pasta?—and places it in her basket. Ren is still staring at her.

“I’m sorry,” she manages eventually. “Do I know you?”

They are still not quite facing each other. Rey glances down and her eyes rest for a moment on his hand, pale against his dark clothing, broad-fingered and starkly veined. As her gaze travels back up his arm to his face, she has a sudden vision—it feels almost like a memory—of someone carrying her effortlessly, of strong arms and strong hands. Something vaguely unpleasant passes through her mind. She shakes it off as she meets his eyes again.

His dark gaze is unsettled. He turns to face her properly and to offer his hand.

“I’m Kylo Ren.”

She reaches for his hand.

“Rey Niima.”

She watches as her hand disappears almost entirely into his. His grip is all bone and sinuous muscle and unexpected warmth. Their hands fall away; he looks down at her. She notices now the moles dotted across his face, the boxer-like quality of his long nose, the surprisingly soft and generous appearance of his crooked mouth. The scar that creases his cheek and interrupts his eyebrow throws his face into further asymmetry, and makes the utterly symmetric intensity of his eyes all the more striking.

And there it is again—that sense of déjà vu, that intense conviction that she’s met this man before. That she’s _known_ him before. “Have we met?” She blurts out.

His guarded gaze darkens, intensifies; his mouth works silently. The silent intensity of him, the roiling of emotion just below the surface, is familiar. This dance that they dance around each other, of silence and stares and unspoken words, is familiar. Everything about this is just _too familiar_.

“Um.” Rey feels the panic rising and struggles to push it back down, hefts the basket, realizes distantly that she still needs to get cat food. “It was…nice meeting you, Kylo.”

She turns on her heels and leaves.

\---

Ren turns onto the street the next morning, right on time. The snow that had covered the city in such silent, pristine beauty before is now trodden, melted and re-frozen, clumping unevenly on rooftops and walls, stained to dull browns and grays by dirt and salt.

He hazards a glance at Rey’s usual window. The light is on, but she isn’t there.

\---

Ren dreams that night. He dreams of warmth, of the midday sun, of the sweet, temporary relief of a summer breeze. He dreams of a scattering of freckles across a delicate sun-kissed nose, of the slight upward curl of thick lashes, of wide brown eyes staring at him, the hazel shot through with flecks of gold. Everything about her is gold. Everything about her is light.

The dream shifts. Snow and branches whip across his face in a violent wind. In the distance, he hears the massive, unending roar of machines, the groaning of the earth, the screams and cries of people in pain.

Flashes of red and blue light, and the sizzle of blades colliding. He catches a glimpse of his assailant—a lithe flowing figure, alternately fending off and returning his jabs, fear and anger rolling off them in waves.

Then, searing pain across his right cheek. Blood.

He wakes with a start.

\---

It’s several days after their run-in at the grocery store when they run into each other again. Rey’s day runs unexpectedly long, and she hurries out the employee exit into the parking lot, zipping up her jacket as she strides toward her car, fully intent on rushing home and feeding BB8. As she picks her way around piles of grimy black ice, she spies a black car still parked in the otherwise deserted parking lot, and notices that it has tinted windows. Beside the open door, just about to step into the car, stands Kylo Ren, who locks eyes with her almost immediately.

Rey lurches to a stop, surprised at how pleased she is to see him. She isn’t able, however, to discern from his expression whether he feels the same way. She changes direction, despite her misgivings about this entire situation, and approaches his car. He watches, unmoving.

Her words die on her lips as she stops a few feet away. He scans their surroundings to be sure that they are alone. When he is satisfied, his eyes snap back to hers.

“Will you have coffee with me?” He says quickly.

_There it is_. That intensity, that straightforwardness. He isn’t afraid to ask for—to demand, really—what he wants, and she knows it.

She swallows and nods.

\---

A thousand practicalities ring like alarms in her head as she drives home. They agreed to meet later in the evening, at 8, at an unassuming café a few blocks from the grocery store. She lists off the practicalities to herself as she speeds past bare trees and drab strip malls.

She doesn’t know this man. She didn’t even know his name until maybe a month ago? She has feelings and thoughts and dreams about him that can only be described as wildly irrational, baseless, obsessive, perhaps delusional. And he frightens her. No, it’s more than that; he, a complete stranger, evokes a cocktail of emotions in her that she has never felt before, and that she cannot even begin to describe…and _that_ frightens her.

_Why is she doing this?_

She pulls up at a stoplight, and realizes that she has been racing in circles in her mind. She tries to focus on breathing, on driving. Despite her misgivings, she knows that she accepted his invitation with much less thought than she should have, and she knows that she is going to be at the café later that evening. She rails at herself in frustration, but it’s fruitless; it’s almost as though a dormant part of her has awoken and taken the wheel, a part that bucks practicalities and flight instincts and all else that she clings to, and she has been consigned to watch the consequences unfold. And that frightens her most.

\---

The café is almost empty on this Thursday evening; it’s a mystery why they keep it open past noon, really. Rey walks in, stomping the dirty snow from her boots and unraveling her scarf from her neck, a couple minutes late (on purpose), and nods a greeting to the bent old woman presiding over the chalkboard menu and the tempting selection of baked goods at the counter. The air is warm and spiced, and the dim wooden interior with string lights draped around windows and between ceiling beams ease Rey’s nerves a little.

Rey swiftly orders a mug of green tea, mostly to chase the cold from her fingers. She pays the old woman, returns the old woman’s smile with a weak attempt at one, and steals a glance at the corner of the room, where Ren has seated himself at a table, and is watching her.

She carries the mug carefully to where he’s seated and folds herself self-consciously into the chair across the table from him. Fiddles with the many-times-washed mug. Glances out the window at the dark, penetrated only by straggling lights in storefronts and passing cars. Cautiously meets his eyes again. She doesn’t have to see the expression in his face to feel the energy coiled in his body, as though he is preparing to physically pounce on her.

“Have you eaten?” She ventures. She can’t tell if he stopped anywhere between work and the café; by all appearances, he came here directly.

“Yes,” he says, and she knows then that it’s a lie.

“Would…would you like me to get something for you?” Rey offers weakly, gesturing at the pastries.

Ren leans forward. “Who are you? Why do I feel like I already know you?” He demands abruptly, brushing her question aside.

Rey bristles. “I have every right to ask the same of you.”

“If I knew the answer, I wouldn’t be asking.”

“Then I suppose neither of us know.”

His frown intensifies—everything about this man is so _intense_ —before his gaze suddenly drops to the coffee mug clenched in his ridiculously large hands.

“I don’t know how to explain it,” he finally says, his voice lowered. “It makes no sense, but I… I feel like I know you. Like I’ve known you for a long time, and this is a reunion, rather than a first meeting. I…” He trails off, unable to find the words.

“I feel it too,” Rey assures him.

He looks up at her. “Do you have any specific memories? Maybe we met in passing at some point? Mutual acquaintance, or something?” He presses, this time a little less intensely.

Rey shakes her head. “I’ve only had…vague dreams. Feelings,” she says, faltering on the word ‘feelings’. It’s a cliché and frustratingly unspecific word, but there is none other that she can think of.

“Dreams?” Ren repeats.

“Yes, but…unfamiliar. Otherworldly?” Rey tries.

“Like they were planted by someone else,” Ren offers. Rey nods; that’s exactly how it feels, in fact. _Does he have them too?_

“Tell me about yourself,” Ren says.

Rey swallows. “Uh, well... I…” She falters; she has had very little experience talking honestly and openly about her past. “I…am not sure where I was born, or whom I was born to.”

“You were abandoned,” Ren says quietly. Rey takes a moment to let the word pass by, and nods.

“I was left outside a homeless shelter.” The story that is normally so difficult to tell seems to unfold from her naturally and comfortably as Ren listens, his dark eyes fixed on her.

“I was at an orphanage for a few years, then sort of bounced from foster home to foster home,” Rey continues. “Went to school, all the way up through high school. Couldn’t afford college tuition, of course, so I ended up going to trade school. I was an electrician and an assistant mechanic for a few years, actually,” Rey says, with a flicker of pride. It was not easy, finding the time to complete her high school studies, fending off the questions and sneering comments of her classmates, getting herself into trade school. Saying hello every time a new family took her in, and good-bye every time a family let her go.

“No one adopted you?” Ren asks.

“No one.”

“Why?”

Rey stares at him for a moment. “I guess I didn’t want to be adopted,” she finally says. “A few folks tried to. They seemed nice, really.”

“But?”

“It’s not something I want to talk about,” she says, trying not to snap. He nods, backs down.

“Anyway,” she continues, “I was an electrician for a few years, took a couple mechanic classes and apprenticed a bit at some car shops… And I loved all of it. The work was good. I just got tired of how seasonal the work was. Wanted something more stable.”

“And you landed a job in the warehouse.”

Rey shrugs. “That’s about it, yeah.”

“Did you ever find your birth parents?”

“No.”

“Have you looked?”

“Of course.” She does not describe the years of agonized curiosity, the frustratingly little information that the shelter provided, the way she automatically scans for physical similarities in every older couple she comes across.

“Have you ever been at the end of your tether?” He asks. An unexpected, invasive question. But she understands what he means, and considers her answer. She thinks of the sleepless nights that have accosted her into adulthood, of lying awake in bed, trying to piece together an impossible puzzle of love and abandonment and self-worth and belonging, trying to overcome the tides of loneliness and rejection.

“What do you do when you’re at your limit? What do you picture when you’re desperate to sleep?” He continues, his voice now barely audible.

Rey’s blood chills. _How can he know about that?_ “How dare you,” she says lowly.

“I’m sorry,” Ren says, his voice back to its normal tone, leaning away slightly and glancing down at his cooling coffee.

“How can you possibly know about that?” Rey searches Ren’s face.

He searches hers in return, and sees an emotion that is raw and true finally peeking through her carefully-constructed, doe-eyed mask.

“I’m not sure,” he says. “Lucky guess, I suppose.”

“Very lucky,” Rey says, scowling. The moment passes, but Rey stores it away. 

\---

It turns out the café closes at 8:30 on Thursdays, and at 8:25 the little old lady behind the counter comes by to kindly let them know. Ren and Rey return their mugs to the designated bin, pull on their winter things, thank the little old lady, and eye each other uncertainly as they stand outside the café doors. Rey peers back into the café fleetingly, and sees that the little old lady has paused in the middle of wiping down their table and is staring at them with a disconcertingly probing gaze.

“We aren’t done,” Ren says, and Rey, snapping her eyes back to his, begins to realize that she can always depend on him to say what needs to be said, and she’s okay with that for now.

“Late dinner somewhere? A bar?” She suggests. They decide on the one over on Catilon Street.

\---

Rey parks her car in her apartment garage and walks quickly down the quiet block and across the street to the one pub in the small suburban town. The bell on the door jangles as she swings it open. There’s a moment of doubt as she scans the occupants in the dimly lit room, before her eyes lock onto Ren’s. She picks her way over to the booth he’s selected, careful to avoid eye contact with everyone else in the room, and for the second time that evening, she’s folding herself self-consciously into a seat across from him.

He slides her a menu wordlessly.

“What’re you having?” She says, for the sake of saying something. The tinny radio music and the shouts and slurred speech of the other patrons doesn’t seem to alleviate the tension between them.

“Probably just a burger of some kind,” he says, not seeming to be particularly interested in any one item. “You?”

Her eyes glance down the front of the menu. “Maybe some chips,” she says, even though she isn’t at all in the mood for food. Ren signals a waiter and places their orders.

Rey picks at her chips, breaking them into smaller pieces and swirling them in the assorted dips, and watches as Ren devours his burger. The sheer massiveness of him hits her afresh as she watches his broad, long-fingered hands hold the burger together easily (she always struggles with the toppings slipping out left and right), and as she watches him finish off his burger in exactly four clean bites (she doesn’t think she has ever been able to finish a burger in fewer than twenty).

“So,” she says as he starts working on the fries in his plate, “tell me about _your_ self.”

“It _is_ my turn, isn’t it,” Ren agrees, flashing a reluctant grin. He pushes his plate of fries to the center of the table, and she unreservedly helps herself to a couple.

“Well,” he begins, drawing out the word and the pause after it, “I was born in Hanna City.”

“Oh!” Rey supposes she should have guessed that he was born in the capital city of one of the richest provinces. She’s never been, but she’s heard things, seen photos, wondered what it would be like to live in such a wealthy and colorful city.

Ren nods. “My mother was a politician on the rise at the time, and my father a small business owner. Princess and the pauper. Everyone was extremely interested in their wedding, and in me.”

“That sounds…” Rey takes a moment to find the word. “Awful,” she finally comes up with, cracking an apologetic grin, and Ren huffs.

“Fair assessment,” he concedes. “In fact, I complained so much about it that my parents shipped me off to my uncle’s place before I was ten.”

“What did you dislike so much?”

“Oh, you know. Being recognized everywhere. Being asked about my mother all the time, about her personal life. Being the poster child of her causes. Being bullied and treated differently at school.”

“And why to your uncle’s?”

“He lives in Ahch-To, which you probably know is almost entirely deserted. They figured it was remote enough to make me happy.”

Rey swallows the fry that she was chewing. “But how could your parents just send you off like that? Wouldn’t they have wanted to keep you close to home?”

“Don’t think for a moment that my parents were sad to see me go,” Ren almost snarls, startling Rey. “By the time I left, my mother’s career was in full upswing and she was too busy to look after a ten-year-old boy. My father was always away on business. Couldn’t even remember my birthday sometimes. When I left for my uncle’s, they had already begun to drift away from home. From each other, and from me.”

“Are they divorced?” Rey asks quietly.

“They never untied all the legal knots,” Ren says. “But they were very much estranged by the time I made my way back to Hanna City.”

“So are they…not together at all anymore?”

Ren looks her straight in the eye. “You could say that. My father’s dead.”

“Oh,” Rey says, inexplicably crestfallen. “Sorry for your loss.”

Ren scowls at the fries and says nothing.

“How did he die?”

Ren shakes his head slowly and doesn’t respond. Rey senses that he isn’t willing to talk about it yet, and backs away.

“How is your mother doing, then?”

“I don’t want to talk about her,” Ren snaps, almost cutting her off.

“Okay… So,” Rey says after a long beat of silence passes, “how did you end up leaving Ahch-To?”

“College,” Ren replies.

“And how did you end up here?”

“I bounced between a few companies and ended up here about a year ago.”

Rey contemplates prodding further, but she can sense a losing battle when she’s in one, and the tension with which Ren is now holding himself tells her that he is done answering questions. She recedes from him, both emotionally and physically.

He glances up at her. “Sorry for snapping,” he mutters. She nods stiffly.

More silence.

“I guess what we’ve established so far,” Ren says slowly, almost hesitantly, “is that there is no way we’ve run into each other before this point.”

“I would agree,” Rey says. Ren has lived exclusively in places Rey’s only dreamed of; there’s no way they could have run into each other.

“Which means we’re not any closer to figuring out why…” He trails off, gesturing between them. Rey nods, agreeing again.

Ren sighs. “None of this makes any sense,” he grinds out, running a long hand through his hair. Rey watches, sympathetic and silent. He pulls his fingers out of his hair and folds his hands before him on the table, his eyes suddenly on her again.

“It’s getting late. Can I…see you again sometime?” Ren asks hesitantly. It’s a little alarming, how quickly his emotional state seems to change, how quickly he morphs from impatient rage to subdued, almost vulnerable pleading. Rey is caught off guard again by the whirlpool of emotions that he seems to only barely contain, by the intensity of him, by _everything_ about him.

“Please?” Ren presses, his dark eyes bright with—something. Need? Hope?

Rey eyes him warily, glad for the distance forced between them by the table. There is a part of her that wants, against all reason, to accept, to see him as often as she can.

“Why?” She asks, pushing the eager, insistent voice down.

“Because,” Ren answers, faltering, “because I…I feel like I finally found you. After years of searching and waiting. This feels more like a reunion than a first meeting with a stranger.”

“You were looking for me?”

“Not exactly. Not _consciously_.”

“So you were _subconsciously_ looking for me?”

“No, I just…” Ren’s words stutter to a stop, and he looks so frustrated that Rey feels a burst of sympathy.

“I’m sorry,” she relents. “I know what you mean. It just… None of this makes sense. And I’m…afraid, I guess.”

“Of what?”

Rey looks away.

“Of me?” Ren tries.

“No,” Rey answers immediately.

“Then of what?”

Rey shakes her head.

Ren leans back a bit in his booth, and she feels a sudden, inexplicable stab of panic at the possibility of him getting up and leaving. But instead of doing that, he simply stares at her.

“Look, I won’t make you do something you’re not comfortable with,” he finally says. “If you want me to never speak to you again, I’ll do that.”

Rey knows for a fact that that’s _not_ what she wants. It must show on her face, because Ren smirks at her, ever so slightly.

“What is it you want?” He asks.

Rey’s gaze flickers between his always-too-intense gaze and the smirk on his lips, and isn’t able to answer.

“How does coffee tomorrow after work sound?” Ren offers. It’s safe, innocuous.

“As long as you promise to eat dinner beforehand,” Rey half-jokes.

Ren’s eyes light up a bit at her tone. “Dinner, then?”

Rey is taken aback. That is _not_ what she meant to imply. “What?”

“Is there a place you like in particular?”

“No, I…” Rey is caught somewhere between trying to think of a reason to decline and trying to think of an actual restaurant that she likes. She’s spent most of her adult life either scraping together dinners from leftovers and cheap groceries, or grabbing takeout at the cheapest restaurant her fancy would allow.

“How about you think of a place sometime between now and tomorrow evening?” Ren suggests, almost too eager to follow through with this idea.

“I… I really…” Rey stammers.

“On me,” Ren adds.

_That_ makes Rey pause.

“No!” She exclaims, both to her own thoughts and to Ren. “No, I really can’t let you do that.”

“Of course you can,” Ren says dismissively. “It’ll give us more time to talk. And you’ll have the satisfaction of knowing that I ate dinner. And _I’ll_ have the satisfaction of knowing that you’ve had something other than pasta. _And_ you won’t have to pay a cent,” he fires in quick succession.

Rey glares at him, furiously unable to decide.

“Ready to go?” He says breezily, shooting her a smug grin.

\---

He insists on walking her home after learning that she’d dropped her car off earlier. As they cut across a street, she steals a glance at his face, and finds, to her surprise, that the smug grin from earlier is still tugging faintly at his mouth. Perhaps he’s pleased with the way he finagled a dinner date into their Friday evening plans. Or perhaps he’s amused at how she’s forced to quicken her stride to keep up with his much longer legs, his much larger feet.

Whatever it is, it’s still there as they approach the front outer doors of her apartment, and as he stands in the doorway, watching her fumble with the lock on the inner door. When she swings it open to step inside, glancing at him quickly, she sees the grin fade, and some of the intensity return to his gaze. She catches the door as it’s swinging closed.

“Dinner tomorrow, then?” He asks, as if he isn’t sure he’ll see her again.

She lets the door swing shut. She holds his gaze for a moment through the glass, and watches as he heads back out into the night.

\---


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to all who left comments/kudos on the first chapter! The first few chapters of this story are pretty much already set in stone, so I will be able to post those fairly quickly, at least. We'll see about the later chapters, though, haha...

“You sounded surprised when I said I was from Hanna City,” Ren says after they place their orders. Rey had dragged her workday out long enough to miss the mass exodus of employees in the evening, and when she walked cautiously out into the parking lot, there he’d been, leaning against his car, looking up from his phone and catching sight of her the moment she emerged. He’d slipped his phone into his pocket and allowed the corners of his mouth to rise ever so slightly as she drew near. They’d decided on Italian.

“Oh, it had more to do with Hanna City itself,” Rey says, chasing rigatoni and slices of sausage around her plate. “I’ve always wanted to visit. I mean I know that it’s a tourist trap and all, but… I’d like to see it sometime for myself, just once.”

“And how do you explain the misty look in your eyes when I mentioned Ahch-To?” Ren asks, smirking triumphantly at her wide-eyed embarrassment.

“My eyes did not look ‘misty,’” Rey grumbles, shoving whatever pasta she’d managed to spear into her mouth.

“Well?” Ren presses.

“I don’t know. It’s just…” Rey chews thoughtfully. “Remember when you asked me about what I dream of when I’m at the end of my tether?” She finally says.

Ren’s face falls, and his eyes drop to his bowl of Cacciucco. “I’m sorry about that,” he says quietly.

Rey shakes her head. “It’s all right. Anyway, you asked what I dream of.”

“An ocean,” Ren says abruptly. His gaze remains fixed on his seafood stew. Rey stares at him.

“An island. Small. Mostly rocks,” he continues. “Clear skies. Green and blue. Like Ahch-To, now that I think about it.”

Rey feels as if her heart has been torn out of her chest and stomped into the painted tiles of the restaurant floor.

“How,” she says slowly, “can you _possibly_ know?”

When he’d last asked about what she pictured when she couldn’t sleep, she hadn’t been sure exactly what to think. Perhaps he’d surmised that she pictured something calming. Perhaps he’d even guessed that it involved a landscape of some sort. But she hadn’t expected…

“Answer me,” she demands. “How can you know?”

“I don’t know,” Ren grits through his teeth. He sets his fork down and runs his hands through his hair. “I don’t know,” he repeats. “I just… I dreamt it.”

“You dreamt what, exactly?”

“Last night, I dreamt that I…I could see into your mind,” he says lamely. “You were alone at night in a dark room, sleeping. I reached out and just— _looked_ into your mind, and I saw an ocean with a small island in it. Nothing else. Just an endless blue sky, and a boundless ocean, and a green rocky island…”

Ren trails off, his eyes distant as he calls the vision to mind. He looks peaceful, almost as if he’s standing on the island himself, staring out across the endless ocean, searching with his eyes for conflict on the horizon and finding none.

“It was beautiful,” he says, wistfully, helplessly.

Rey feels inexplicably betrayed. “How…” she sputters.

Ren reaches across the table to grab her hand, and it’s then that she realizes that she is shaking. She drops her fork, and it clatters loudly onto the table.

“That’s not okay,” Rey says, struggling to not raise her voice. “That island and that ocean are _mine_. You have no business invading—no business knowing—” She’s babbling now.

Ren reaches with his other hand across the table as well, and he’s holding her down, he’s anchoring her. “It’s okay,” he says, frantic, trying to offer comfort despite his own confusion. “I’ve got you.”

“You stole something that wasn’t yours! You stole the only thing that was mine,” Rey quavers, and she realizes that tears are rolling down her cheeks, falling onto the newest, nicest sweater she owns, the one she wore today especially for him.

“I didn’t mean to,” Ren pleads. “I never meant to take it, or to make you share it. I don’t judge you. I won’t hurt you. I don’t want to take it from you. Please,” he says, “please don’t leave.”

His words cut through to her. She realizes then that she’s on her feet, tugging away from him as hard as she can, his hands like iron cuffs around her wrists. She stops struggling for a moment, takes in the stares of the patrons around them, finally notices the gangly red-haired waiter who’s rushed to her elbow and is asking if she is all right.

She sits back down in her chair and yanks her wrists out of Ren’s grip. “I’m fine,” she reassures the waiter, seeing the naked concern in his face and feeling a rush of guilt and embarrassment. “I’m fine. I’m sorry.”

“Is he bothering you?” The waiter persists, gesturing to Ren, who subjects him to the full force of his glare.

“No, no,” Rey says quickly. “I’m sorry. I…I overreacted. He wasn’t hurting me or anything. I’m fine.”

“All right,” the waiter says slowly, still doubtful. “Please let me know if you need anything at all.” He backs away from them slowly, alternating between nodding at Rey’s reassurances and shooting Ren suspicious glances.

Rey watches as the poor waiter recedes to the kitchen entrance, and stares down into her rigatoni dinner. She feels her throat close at the idea of more food. _So much for the free meal_. She peers up at Ren. He’s still tense, his hands still outstretched on the table, his eyes wide and dark. Rey plants her face in her hands. 

“I’m sorry,” she mumbles. “I don’t know why I reacted that way.”

“No, you don’t have to apologize for anything,” Ren says quickly. “I didn’t mean to freak you out. I… I wish I could understand what is going on with us.“

“I know,” she whispers. How could she fault him for having dreams? How could she blame him for seeing things that he hadn’t asked to see? Still, the knowledge that someone else knows about her island is unsettling. The fact that she now has to share her shining, solitudinous mental safehaven grieved her in a way that surprised her.

She peeks up at Ren again and sees that he is looking away, clenching his hands helplessly.

“It’s all right,” she says, sincerely, reaching over the table. He looks at the proffered hand. Before she can withdraw it and plant it awkwardly back at her side, he grabs it.

And presses a close-mouthed kiss to her knuckle.

“I _am_ sorry. If you don’t want to talk to me about it, that’s okay.” 

He releases her hand. She whips it back to her side, and she’s wondering if it’s possible to blush so hard as to burn to a crisp from the inside out. She mutters a barely-audible “Okay” and refuses to look him in the eye.

“If you’d like,” he tries after some time passes, after the blush has receded from her cheeks to her neck, “we can visit Ahch-To sometime.”

Rey’s eyes start back to Ren as she imagines driving up the coast of the Ileenium province, through the lush, dense greenery and over the meandering streams, then crossing the channel on a ferry and watching as Ahch-To appears on the horizon…

“It’s not the most ideal season to visit Ahch-To, but it’s still a beautiful island. And we could also see Hanna City, if you’d like.” Ren grimaces. “I’m afraid there isn’t much for me there, though. But we have some business meetings in both of those areas coming up over the next few months, so maybe...”

Rey continues to stare at him.

“It’s an honest offer,” he reassures her.

“It’s an expensive trip,” Rey shoots back.

“Let me worry about that.”

“I can’t do that,” Rey sighs. “How can I go on trips and take handouts from my employer?”

“You want to go. We both know you do,” Ren points out, and he’s not wrong. “And now you’re getting the chance to. Why turn it down?”

“I can’t just do what I want,” Rey says, taken aback by his forwardness. “I’ve worked hard to get to where I am today.” _I’ve worked hard to afford regular meals, to have furnishings, to not have to go dumpster diving every week._ “I can’t just let go of all of it and run off doing whatever I want. I mean, what if we get caught?”

“We’ll be cautious, then.”

“But if I travel to these places, I’ll want to do everything. To experience everything.”

Ren grins. “Then that’s what we’ll do.”

“But we _can’t_!”

“Rey,” he says, leaning forward—and the waiter from earlier looks ready to rush back onto the scene—“when do you plan to start living the life that you’ve worked so hard to win? I understand that your past was difficult. I understand that you’ve worked hard to get this far. But it’s time to let it go. It’s time to let the past die.”

Rey stares at Ren, her eyes like saucers. The _want_ —to travel, to see, to experience, to spend time with _him_ —is incredibly strong, almost stronger than she can resist. But—

“It’s not that simple, Kylo,” she insists instead.

“But it is,” he counters. “It really is. We wouldn’t be doing anything wrong, not technically. What can our company get upset about if it’s just two friends going on a weekend trip?”

“You can’t be sure that that’s what everyone will think. I mean, the power dynamic alone...”

“So what? Worst case scenario, one of us leaves the company and finds another job.”

“Where would I find another job?” Rey is almost furious at his flippancy. “I’ve already got one that I don’t deserve. I’ve got no talents, no…no spark. Nothing about me is special. Where on earth would I find—?“

“Don’t.” Ren bites out this word, iron in his eyes. She flinches.

“Don’t what?” She bites back.

“Don’t say that about yourself.”

“Why not?”

“Because it isn’t true.”

“You don’t know anything about me.”

Ren chuckles dryly. “You and I both know that that’s not true.”

“We met three days ago,” she says between gritted teeth. “We have weird dreams and irrational feelings about each other. That does _not_ constitute knowing each other. And it does not mean you have the right to say that you know me, or that—that—”

“That you’re not a nobody?”

Rey glares daggers at him. She doesn’t know why she let this stranger this far in. She doesn’t understand why she allowed herself to feel so comfortable around him. She readies herself for breaking the bond, for cutting the tie. She’s _eager_ for it. It’ll show him. It’ll show him that they aren’t anything to each other after all, because isn’t that always true in the end? Don’t people always leave you? Isn't it better to be alone?

Ren reaches over and covers one of her hands with his own.

“You’re not a nobody, Rey. Not to me.”

And just like that, he’s ruined her.

\---

They’re standing in the parking lot, after a quiet (albeit delicious) dessert. Rey stares down at her boots. She’s not proud of how the night went, and not in the least happy about it. She can’t tell if it’s the snowflakes in the biting wind that are stinging her eyes, or if it’s her own self-loathing.

She’s ready to turn on her heels and flee to her car, flee home to the company of BB8, but Ren calls her name before she can make a getaway.

“I meant everything I said tonight,” he tells her quietly. His eyes above his tall coat collar are intense, but in a different way just now. “You’re not a nobody to me. And the offer to take you to Ahch-To and Hanna City still stands.”

It’s difficult, headache-inducing even, to reconcile his words with her inner mantra and her staunchly self-imposed independence. Something about it riles her, even. Instead of unpacking all of that now, she merely shoves the bundle of emotions away and nods.

“Can I call you sometime this weekend?” He asks.

“You have my number?”

“Internal web portal.”

“Oh, right. Yeah, that’s fine,” she finally mumbles, looking away. The rapidly-falling snowflakes begin to catch in her hair, her lowered eyelashes, the faux fur collar of her coat. He watches as she shoves her hands into her pockets, as she rapidly re-erects her walls and barriers until she’s hardly anything more than the girl he glimpsed in the warehouse window.

“I…”

Her gaze jumps up to his throat, and she finds that she really isn’t prepared to look him in the face right now. “I’ve got to go,” she says, and almost runs to the safety of her car.

\---

Despite the fact that it’s a Saturday morning, and the fact that BB8 is seemingly preoccupied in some other part of her apartment and has chosen, for the time being, to leave her in peace, Rey starts to wakefulness at precisely 6am. Glancing at her tiny bedside clock and groaning, Rey rolls over and re-tucks her blankets around her, sighing in her warm nest of comfort, intent on falling back asleep.

But it’s too late; BB8, sensing a disturbance in the stillness of the morning, pads into her room, tail straight up in the air, and jumps onto her bed with his usual ‘good-morning-feed-me’ yowl. Rey ducks her head under the covers.

After several minutes of being bopped lightly on the head by BB8’s front paws, Rey drags herself out of bed, selects a blanket at random to wrap herself in, and pads into the kitchen, her toes curling at the iciness of the tiles. Perhaps getting breakfast for BB8 will distract him long enough for her to sneak back to bed and catch a few more winks.

But after dumping a can of wet food into BB8’s bowl and diving back into her nest of plush and quilts, Rey finds herself frustratingly wide awake, staring at the ceiling. Dawn is fanning its rose-colored fingers across the lightening sky, and the weather promises to be clear, cold, and still. Rey wonders absently if she’ll be able to convince herself to leave the house and take a walk around the frozen lake a few blocks away, and maybe capture a few photos with her new camera—

All peaceful thoughts wilt and fall from her mind, however, as the memory of the previous evening crashes into her mind suddenly, like a tidal wave, and she groans, bringing her hands to her face.

It’s still incomprehensible, the way she reacted to Ren’s simple revelation. It’s not like he has any control over this weird connection they have, or the things he sees when he dreams. It’s not like he’s involved with her by choice. She really didn’t need to take it all so personally.

Sure, it hurts to know that her island, her ocean, her breathtakingly deep blue sky, are spoilt by the presence and knowledge of someone else. It feels like an invasion of sorts; a crossing of a boundary that could never be un-crossed.

But she had known, all this time, that at some point she would have to let go of it all. She had known that one day the world she lived in would eclipse her dreams, that the peace and belonging she sought would never be a reality. In fact, she should have been prepared for it all to be taken away from her.

And besides, is it so bad that the one who’s discovered her inner sanctum is none other than Kylo Ren? As far as she could tell, if she had to choose someone to share her island with, well. It’s not like she has many people in her life to choose from in the first place.

The taste in her mouth is bitter. She wonders if brushing her teeth and making pancakes for breakfast will take the taste away.

\---

She’s tripping back and forth in her kitchen, combining pancake ingredients at a leisurely pace, when her cell phone rings. She turns the phone around with her elbow (her fingers are covered in egg whites) and sees an unfamiliar number.

As she rinses her hands, she remembers with a start that Ren had asked if he could call her. She stares at her still-ringing phone, suddenly apprehensive. Would he really be so bold as to actually call her this early on a Saturday morning?

She wavers above her phone indecisively. She answers it on its last ring.

“Hello?” She says timidly, and—

“Rey?”

_It’s him._

“Hi,” she says, and she deserves an Oscar for the steadiness of her voice.

“Good morning.” Even over the phone, his voice is startlingly deep, smooth. She’s never had expensive wine before (doesn’t even know what makes it so expensive), but she wonders if it would be a suitable analogy.

“Um,” he says, after an awkwardly long silence passes, during which she is so absorbed in her rising panic that she forgets to speak. “Is this not a good time?”

“No, no, this is fine,” Rey says quickly. “Sorry, you just—caught me off guard.”

“Didn’t think I’d actually call you?”

“Yeah,” she admits.

“Well, here we are.”

BB8 chooses that moment to leap onto the counter, narrowly missing the pancake batter, and to yowl loudly at Rey.

“What was that?”

Rey can’t help but laugh. “BB8, my cat.”

“BB—what?”

“8, like the number eight. My cat’s name is BB8.”

“Oh. What inspired the name?”

“His shelter tag ID. ‘BB8’ were the last three characters.”

“Well,” Ren considers an appropriate reply while Rey rescues the batter from BB8’s scavenging, “that’s…memorable?”

“You hear that?” Rey coos to BB8, whose tawny golden eyes are still fixed on the bowl. “You’re memorable, you silly floof.”

“Is he up to something?”

“He tried to get into my pancake batter.”

“Ah, you’re making pancakes?”

“I enjoy making a nice breakfast when I have the time.”

Ren digests that in silence, and he doesn’t even have to be in the room for Rey to know that he’s connecting the dots between her enjoyment of cooking and her days as an orphan without roots, without family, without knowledge of where her next meal was coming from.

“I’d like to cook for you sometime,” he finally says.

“I—what?”

“I said I’d like to cook for you sometime.”

“No, I heard you, I just… You don’t have to offer to do that.”

“Is it your natural instinct to say no to everything?”

Rey sets the pancake batter on a bit of unoccupied counter space and flips the pancakes she’s currently cooking. “Do you always invite women to do uncomfortably intimate things with you?” She counters.

“Is me cooking for you uncomfortably intimate?”

“I think so.”

“Duly noted. So would you like to do it sometime?”

Rey feels a pull. She isn’t able to deny it to herself; as insensible as it is to skip over to a stranger’s home and accept a home-cooked meal from him, she feels a desire to draw closer to him, even though she is entirely uncertain of the potential consequences of doing so.

“Maybe,” she says indecisively.

“Maybe?”

A beat as Rey slides the freshly-made pancakes out and spoons fresh batter into the pan.

“Do you live near the pub?” She asks presently, unsure if Ren is still on the line.

“Yeah, I do,” he answers promptly. BB8 yawns.

“So you live near me.”

“Yeah.”

“Would you—” Rey pauses for a moment, frowning down at the cooking pancakes, kicking herself. She gives in. 

“Would you like to come over for pancakes?”

“I thought it was an uncomfortably intimate thing to do?” Ren says lightly. Then, quickly: “Only if you’ll come over for dinner.”

Rey glares harder at the pancakes, even as her knees wobble. “Only if you don’t make me regret it,” she quips.

“Deal. Should I come over now?”

Rey gives him her apartment number, then realizes that she’s still in her pajamas—a free t-shirt from some event at trade school, and a pair of faded pants with a silly corgi print—and runs to throw on more presentable clothes. She glances around her cluttered apartment, suddenly realizing that she won’t have time to tidy it up in the least. As she stands there fretting, her buzzer chimes, and shortly after she attends to that, her doorbell is ringing. BB8 pads to the door with his usual quick step, tail in the air, and sits at the foot of the door, looking up at her expectantly. She stares at the door, wide-eyed. _What is happening to her?_

She peers through the peephole and catches a glimpse of black wool, wavy black hair, pale skin—and stumbles away from the door.

“Rey?”

She breathes. One, two. Wipes her hands nervously on her leggings. Opens the door.

Ren stands there, a shadow in her doorway, looking almost too tall for her entire apartment. He peers down at her as she opens the door. They stand there, staring.

BB8 breaks the ice, sauntering into the hallway to examine the strange man. Ren looks down at the white-and-orange cat, watching as it weaves between his heavy snow-stained boots, purring and arching its back.

“Kylo,” Rey says lamely.

“The pancakes smell good,” Ren responds, the corner of his mouth twitching into a half-smile. He’s wearing dark, well-worn jeans and a long casual coat, and what might be a hand-knit scarf wrapped haphazardly around his neck. His hair appears tousled—perhaps by the wind?—and the overall impression is so disarmingly casual that Rey can’t quite comprehend what she’s looking at.

_He’s really here._

“Uh, come in,” she finally says, stepping aside. He crosses the threshold of her apartment slowly, closing the door behind him, standing now on the door mat, and he stares down at her, his gaze heavy. He takes in the sight of her oversized sweater, her straight slender legs, her striking fuzzy socks, her loose, finely-spun brown hair, her doe-eyed gaze. The sunlight is beginning just now to seep in between the slats of her window blinds and through the loose weave of her pastel colored curtains, filling the room with a golden morning glow, wrapping her in its almost-tangible honey warmth, and Ren finds himself arrested by the sight.

“Good morning,” he says instead, and reaches up to unwind his scarf and unzip his coat.

She attempts a smile at him. “You too,” she flails, and beats a hasty retreat to her kitchen to flip the remaining pancakes and to regain control over herself as he struggles with his boots.

Outdoor clothes removed and stowed alongside her things in her impossibly tiny closet, he walks slowly into the living room and takes in the hodgepodge vibrancy of her space, the colorful Rey-ness of it. She’s filled her tiny living room with mismatched furniture, as large as the space would allow; throw pillows of all sizes and colors; throw blankets of all textures; overlapping rugs; plants crowding each other for space and attention; and knickknacks of all sorts, making for strange companions to the worn, sundry books on her bookshelf and adorning the tiny coffee table that she’s managed to wedge between all of the furnishings. She’s opened the window a crack, and a whisper of the crisp winter air mingles with the buttery, eggy aroma of pancakes.

He follows the aroma to the kitchen, and Rey looks up to see this hulking, dark, well-dressed figure framed starkly by the warmth and light of her cramped apartment, and has to suppress a laugh at the way he sticks out (almost painfully so) in her apartment. He steps around BB8, who hounds his steps and takes every opportunity to rub himself against Ren’s jeans.

“They’re just about done. Could you grab some plates?” Rey says, pointing to the cabinet containing her dishes. Ren opens the cabinet and finds himself faced with stacks of dishes of all sizes, shapes, patterns, colors. He finally extricates two relatively normal-looking plates.

She pours two mismatched cups of tea, and they sit at her counter and drizzle honey over the pancakes, and they enjoy the meal in silence.

\---

“BB8’s really taken a liking to you,” Rey observes, giggling, as she leans against the counter. The cat has seated himself on one of Ren’s large, socked feet, and is purring up a storm, rubbing his face contentedly against Ren’s leg. The sleeves of Ren’s woolen sweater and the denim button-up shirt underneath are rolled up to his elbows, and he’s washing the dishes, despite her ardent objections earlier, his hands dwarfing her dishes and kitchenware.

“The answer to your earlier question is no,” Ren says abruptly as he turns off the faucet and places the last dish in her dish rack, being careful to not move the foot on which BB8 has staked his claim.

Rey blinks. “What?”

“Your earlier question. About whether I often invite women to do uncomfortably intimate things with me.” He rests his gaze on her as he reaches for a towel.

“Oh,” Rey says quietly, looking away.

“So?” He says, leaning down to sweep BB8 up into his arms. “Is it your natural instinct to say no to everything?”

The sight of Ren holding BB8’s small, delicate body in his arms, the muscles in his forearms rolling as he gathers the purring ball of fluff close to his chest, makes Rey’s emotions _extremely_ confused.

“Not everything,” Rey says when her breath returns.

“What have you said yes to recently?”

“My...career change?”

“Even you don’t sound sure of that,” Ren chides, winding one hand around BB8’s head to scratch his chin. BB8 arches his neck back immediately, welcoming the touch, his tiny front paws sticking up in the air and kneading furiously. 

“Meeting with you, then?” Rey tries.

Ren pauses for a moment. “Fair,” he acknowledges as he walks toward her living room. Rey follows, and watches as he manages to fold his considerably tall body onto her sofa. She joins him at the other end of the sofa, wrapping herself with one of the throw blankets and drawing her knees up to her chest, and watches as he balances BB8’s small body on his chest and continues his ministrations to the purring cat.

“What’s his story?” Ren asks, nodding down at a very content BB8.

“The folks at the shelter think that he was feral at birth. He’s about two years old now. He’s massively underweight, probably due to malnourishment. But otherwise he seems fine.”

The small bundle of white and orange fur yowls in protest as Ren experimentally withdraws his hand. Ren quickly repairs the situation, and the purring continues.

“He’s a sweet cat,” Ren says, a tentative smile pulling at his features, and Rey decides immediately that her estimation of him has improved. Anyone who likes BB8, and whom BB8 likes, deserves that much in her book.

There’s a beat of comfortable silence, broken only by BB8’s shameless, luxuriant purring.

“Do you have plans for the rest of the day?” Ren asks presently.

Rey shakes her head. “I thought about taking a walk around the lake, but it wasn’t a commitment.”

“Could I accompany you? To the lake?” His gaze is on her again.

Rey can feel her face turning red, and, ducking her gaze, begins picking loose threads out of the blanket that she’s wrapped in.

“What’s this, Kylo?” She mutters. “Breakfast, dinner, and now a walk around the lake?”

“It’s okay if you’re not comfortable with all that.”

“Besides,” Rey adds, “there’s still the possibility of us running into someone from work.”

Ren hums with disappointed agreement. She keeps her gaze down.

“I guess I should leave you to your plans, then?” Ren says.

“I guess,” Rey says. 

He gently removes BB8 from his chest and stands, awkwardly tall and dark among the squat pastel clutter that is her living room, and stares down at her for a moment.

“All right,” he says quietly, and begins picking his way to the front door. Rey extricates herself from the blanket and pads alongside BB8 to the front door, and watches Ren don his coat and scarf and shove his feet into his boots. He then stands there on her doormat, giving her that silent, dark-eyed stare that she thinks she might actually understand, and Rey feels torn between kicking the door open and shoving him out into the hallway, and latching her arms around him and pressing herself close to his chest.

“I’ll see you for dinner, then,” Ren says, his voice softer and more gravelly than it’s ever been around her, and Rey has to struggle to suppress a shudder.

“Yeah,” she murmurs.

He leans down ever so slightly, his gaze flickering to her lips, and she self-consciously draws her lower lip in between her teeth. His eyes shoot back up to hers, and—

“Are you allergic to anything?” He all but whispers.

“What?” Rey blinks up at him. He smirks down at her, and she instantly recomposes herself. 

“No,” she bites out.

He’s chuckling as he opens the door and steps into the hallway. He turns to look at her one more time, his face lit up with a smile that is striking in its rarity.

“I’ll text you my address,” he says, and he’s off down the hallway, swinging the door to the stairs open, disappearing from her sight.

\---

That afternoon, Rey, stirred to restlessness by the thought of dinner with Ren at his apartment, pulls on her winter things and flees to the sanctuary of the frozen lake. Ringed loosely by pines and nestled a good distance away from the nearest main road, the lake is small, secluded, usually deserted, and perfect for quiet, picturesque Saturday afternoons. Rey arrives at the lake, puffing for breath, and wrestles her camera out of its pack, determined to focus entirely on the wintry beauty of the lake, the imperfectly frozen surface of the lake, the clearness of the sky.

Determined to put Ren out of her mind.

She takes several deep breaths, relishing the sting of the fresh cold air against the back of her throat, and the decadent puffs of fogged air that she blows with every exhale. She double-checks the battery on her camera and trudges off toward the lake.

\---

By 5:30pm, Rey is back at her apartment, changed into what she hopes are nice (but not too nice?) clothes, sitting on her bed, silently combatting her raw nerves. She pulls up Ren’s text to reread it yet again (an unceremonious message, with just an address and “7pm”), then chucks her phone onto the bed and flops back onto the blankets with a sigh.

She knows from his street name that he does, in fact, live quite close to her. But the street that he lives on is a different world from the one she lives on; whereas the apartments on her street are small, cramped, and poorly aged, more utilitarian than pleasing to the eye, the ones on his street are fairly newly constructed, spacious, with generous counter space and luxe hardwood flooring and sweeping floor-to-ceiling windows, the exterior finished with elegant Tuscan architectural elements. She knows; she read the promotional materials as soon as the rooms first became available, salivating over the luxuries that she knew she would never be able to afford. Even the greenery on his street is better maintained than the poor excuses for trees and bushes that line hers.

Rey imagines herself in her well-worn overcoat and muddied combat boots, scurrying up the street like a scrawny feral cat, and heaves another sigh.

\---

At precisely 7pm, Rey is standing at the front door of Ren’s lavish apartment building, punching in the number to his room. He doesn’t make her wait; the door buzzes open almost immediately after she enters the number. She’s greeted by a simple but sumptuous lobby area, complete with leather furnishings and thick rugs and a _fireplace_ , and nearly runs for the elevator when she finally spots its (is that art nouveau??) door.

After the smoothest elevator ride of her life, Rey steps out into a warm, dimly-lit hallway, easily finds Ren’s door, and steels herself.

He answers the door a moment after she knocks. He’s thrown a plain apron on top of his jeans and woolen sweater, and his eyes are gentle, and he looks so domestic that it charms Rey to the core.

Rey musters all her courage and steps in as casually as possible. “Nice place,” she comments, taking in his simple—but evidently very expensive—furnishings, the thick cushiony carpeting contrasting beautifully with the dark polished hardwood flooring, the spotless surfaces and surprisingly homey textures, the warm lighting and muted palette, the thick curtains framing sweeping windows that overlook the surrounding suburbia and the city in the distance, and a touch, here and there, of decor that makes the place uniquely his.

But the first thing that really catches her attention is the _smell_. She can’t quite pin down all the flavors and aromas, but Ren is definitely cooking something, and the smell of it is stimulating her salivary glands in an alarming way.

He takes her coat and points out the shoe rack in the closet, then leads her into the kitchen. “I hope you like lamb,” he’s saying as he strides into what is clearly a well- and lovingly-used kitchen. The counter is covered with used dishes and containers of various spices and ingredients, and the stainless steel refrigerator—stocked, from what she can tell—hangs ajar. A pot of something is simmering on the stove, a pan of something else sits quietly with its contents covered, and the oven is on.

Rey thinks of the pancakes she had been struggling with earlier that morning, and blushes helplessly at the contrast.

“Make yourself at home,” Ren says, lifting the lid of the pot and stirring its contents, seemingly oblivious to her discomfort. “Everything will be done soon.”

Rey shuffles into the living room and perches self-consciously on the generous leather sectional. She finds herself sinking into the delicious foam cushioning, and is unable to refrain from leaning back and appreciating the low backing and the wide arm of the sectional. She must look exceedingly comfortable, because when Ren peeks into the room and sees her half-devoured by the sectional, he cracks another one of his rare grins.

“No furry friend,” Rey observes.

“No,” Ren confirms, brushing past her ankles and seating himself on the opposite end at a respectable distance. “I wouldn’t have the time to look after one, anyway.”

“Shame.” She then pictures BB8 slipping and scrabbling across the surface of the leather furniture and knocking over the vases and books and other decor, and decides that maybe it’s for the best.

“What did you do this afternoon?” Ren asks. She finds that she can’t take him seriously with that sauce-stained apron, and averts her eyes as she recounts her day. 

“Ah, you’re into photography?” He says with interest when she mentions her photography.

“I’m an amateur in every way. I love capturing moments and thinking about color and composition, but I’ve never taken any lessons.”

“I’d like to see your work sometime.” Ren tilts his head as he regards her, as if speculating the sort of photography someone like her would produce.

“I’d hardly call it ‘work,’” Rey laughs nervously, uncomfortable under his scrutiny.

A timer goes off in the kitchen, and Ren gets up to attend to the food. “That’s the last of it. I’ll plate everything up.”

Rey pads silently to the dining area (he has a proper dining table and proper matching chairs), and sits, restless and unsure of herself, as he emerges from the kitchen with two plates of steaming food.

“Is there anything you need a hand with?” She calls after him as he retreats back into the kitchen.

He reemerges almost immediately, bearing silverware and napkins. “Nope,” he says as he sets down the silverware. He offers her something to drink, and she insists on water.

After he finally sits down next to her, a glass of red wine at his elbow and a cup of water at hers, they dig in.

Rey finds that she can’t name most of the contents of her plate, but everything is beyond delicious. She focuses on taking small, measured bites, on chewing everything thoroughly, on appreciating the explosive flavors in every mouthful. She interrupts their silence only with occasional questions about the dishes (baked lamb shank, various unfamiliar greens with a sweet sauce that she doesn’t try to pronounce, roasted potatoes that are more delicious than she thought potatoes had the potential to be), and Ren answers her questions with nonjudgmental patience. And when Ren returns to the kitchen briefly and reemerges with a whole cheesecake, baked from scratch, Rey nearly faints.

He offers her fruit at the end of the meal, but Rey’s jeans already feel tighter around her midsection, and she reluctantly refuses. He peels two oranges anyway, and begins working through one slowly, savoring every wedge. And despite herself, she soon finds herself reaching for the other one.

When she sinks into his leather sectional after the meal, the slow give of the foam is even more delicious than it was the first time, and she can’t suppress the sigh of pure contentment that escapes her.

“Good?” He asks, smirking at her as he settles himself next to her at a respectable distance.

“Yes,” she replies grudgingly. “Much better than my pancakes this morning.”

“Your pancakes were delicious,” Ren objects. “Much better than I’ve been able to make.”

“Well, I guess that means we have to share the load,” Rey teases. “I’ll be in charge of breakfast, and you, dinner.”

“Seems fair to me,” Ren agrees, his smirk edging on improperly conspiratorial, and Rey wonders if she’s overstepped their boundaries with that tease.

“So,” she says quickly, leaning away from him slightly and crossing her legs as casually as she can manage, “how did you get into cooking? I have to admit, seeing the President of the company I work at with an apron on and a homemade cheesecake in his hands isn’t something I thought I’d experience in this lifetime.”

“I learned when I was young,” Ren says, mirroring her and leaning back, his eyes veiled.

“In Hanna City?”

“Yeah.”

“Ah, you got to learn with your mother, then?”

Ren looks away. “No. Like I said the other day, she wasn’t really around.”

“With some relatives, then?”

“Not really.”

“...On your own?” The warm, homey image of a child learning to cook under the watchful gaze of an indulgent parent is something that is so ingrained into Rey’s mind by commercials and by social notions that the image of a child facing that task on his own is unimaginable to her.

Ren nods shortly, still not meeting Rey’s eyes, and her pleasantly full stomach clenches.

“When did you learn to cook?” Ren says, sliding his eyes back to hers.

“Oh.” Rey manages a nervous laugh. “I guess you could say that I’m still learning. I didn’t really start to cook for myself until after trade school.”

Ren considers her for a moment. “Any interest in learning?”

“You mean, taking lessons?”

Ren’s smirk returns. “If you thought that tonight’s meal was good, then you need a teacher.”

“And those are the words of a gentleman?” Rey says archly, in mock-horror.

Ren leans closer to her, ever so slightly. “And when,” he says quietly, his gaze intent, “have I ever claimed to be a gentleman?”

There is a dark, unyielding quality to his eyes, a look that Rey hasn't quite seen before, and she edges further away from him, even though she wants nothing more than to do the opposite.

“I suppose you haven’t,” she says, and her words come out as an undignified squeak.

Ren’s eyes flicker to the collar of her sweater, where her delicate collarbone and the lines of her neck are peeking out from behind the rough fabric. He looks back into her eyes again, and she feels anchored there, physically restrained by his gaze—a feeling that, she realizes, rings familiar.

Rey swallows. “Why am I here?” She says, and it comes out as a whisper.

“You accepted my invitation.”

“Why did you invite me?”

He reaches across the space between them and easily encloses one of her wrists loosely in his hand. The warmth of his touch, the feel of his calloused palm against the tender skin of her wrist, sends a thrill down her spine.

“Because I wanted to feed you,” he murmurs. “I wanted to satisfy you.”

Rey’s mind races, trying to decide whether she should yank her wrist from his grip or not, trying to understand the meaning of his words.

He leans closer to her still, a roil of barely-suppressed emotion now bared in his eyes, his brow furrowed with intent, his startlingly full lips parted.

“I’d like to kiss you,” he hisses, and although the words are uttered quietly, they clang about in her mind as if he’d shouted them. It’s a veiled, demanding question.

“Yes,” she breathes, not quite understanding what she’s agreeing to.

He releases her wrist immediately and wraps his arms around her; he pulls her flush against him effortlessly, almost dragging her into his lap. He snakes one of his huge hands up her back and cups the base of her head easily, and she’s caught up momentarily by how large his hands really are, how easily he’s able to hold her with them. She catches a glimpse of his dizzying eyes before he leans his head down and presses a chaste kiss to the corner of her mouth.

She feels burned. She turns her face slightly toward him, and he unhesitantly plants a second close-mouthed kiss on her waiting lips, chaste yet searing in its intensity, and she forgets to breathe.

He groans—or perhaps she does; she isn’t sure. And then he’s fisting the hair at the back of her head and pulling to force her to tilt her chin back, and his lips are on her collarbone, the tender spots under her jaw, the freckled skin of her shoulders. He drags his tongue recklessly along her neck, and a whimper escapes her tightly pursed lips, and she feels his chuckle against her throat.

And then the cool leather of the sectional is at her back, his arms still wrapped easily and securely around her, his face dangerously close to her breasts, his hot breath leaving her skin chilled. She finds that she’s wrapped her arms around his neck, and pulls them away immediately.

“What’s this?” Ren chuckles, lifting his face to look up at her. “You decline my innocent invitation to a day trip, and you decline my equally innocent offer to accompany you to the lake, but you say yes to a kiss?”

The aftertaste of wine, plush and smooth, lingers on her lips. She stares back at him, gasping, furious, the emotions and sensations outpacing her words. Ren tugs the neck of her sweater down and plants another slow kiss just above the swell of her left breast, his hair spilling forward onto her chest. She’s surprisingly sensitive there, and she arches her back involuntarily at the unfamiliar sensation, another strangled whimper escaping from her mouth.

“Are you as crazy about me as I am about you?” He murmurs hotly against her exposed chest, and Rey feels as though she is fraying at the edges, as though the very tapestry of her is being undone.

\---

She touches herself that night, burrowed deep under her blankets. She closes her eyes as beads of sweat begin to form on her brow, and imagines Ren in her bed, his broad shoulders and hands wrapped around her thighs, forcing her legs apart and pinning her down firmly in place against the sheets, his lips and nose slick with her wetness as he gazes up at her from under that mop of tousled black hair, all of his lascivious intent written out clearly in his dark, heady eyes—and she loses herself in the vision, biting back a cry.

\---

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave a comment if you're inclined to! Thanks in advance!


	3. Chapter 3

Rey spends the next few days actively avoiding all contact with Ren, staying well away from windows at work and venturing out to the grocery store only at odd hours. She receives an odd text from him now and then, each conveying concern and confusion, but eventually these fall quiet, and she finds herself transported back to how her life had been before he’d appeared in it. 

A sense of mundane, ritual comfort unfolds to envelope her, almost suffocating her in its cyclic routineness. Slowly, she begins to forget the violent, buzzing colors that Ren brought into her life, the brushstrokes of passion and intensity. Slowly, it all seems to begin to fade to a silent, indiscriminate shade of gray.

\---

Cat food, for BB8. Pasta, for herself.

Rey finds herself prowling the aisles of the grocery store (a cramped cash-only city one, not the one in the suburbs that she usually goes to) during her lunch break (not an ideal time for getting groceries, but one can try, at least).

She methodically paces the aisles, picking up and examining items of interest. She pays half-hearted attention to the cheery Christmas music blaring valiantly from the one speaker in the entire store, vying to be heard above all the other sounds of the city; the hum of the refrigerators, the muttering of the clerk, the chime of the bells on the door as someone else enters the store.

Rey’s eyes flit up from her contemplation of on-sale blueberries, and she should have known, she really should have known, that all this self-imposed separation, this careful quarantining of color, this burying and forgetting and fading, would be utterly useless.

Ren has stepped into the store, brushing errant strands of hair from his eyes impatiently, swinging his gaze from side to side, and then he locks eyes with her, and the moment that intense gaze is on her, she feels the power of it dragging her back up to the surface.

There’s a sudden thunderclap of sound and light, and she’s drenched through, gasping for breath, squinting against the sunlight.

He walks toward her, easily reaching her with a few long strides, and they’re standing face-to-face. She stares at his impossibly broad chest, her gaze skimming over his even broader shoulders and the familiar Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat, and finally up at his face, hard and tense, his mouth pressed into a line, his eyes piercing and raw.

“How did you find me?” She finally says, and finds that her voice is rusty from unuse.

“I saw your car,” Ren motions vaguely at the door. “Was driving by.”

“Why are you here?” She whispers. And then he’s wrapping his arms around her, gathering her close to his chest. Rey is ashamed of how the mere feel of his arms around her is enough to send her mind spinning out of control, but the part of her that has been starved of all forms of affection for all these years rears its head and  _ howls _ .

“Have dinner with me tonight,” he murmurs.

“I’ve tried so hard to forget you,” she says instead, her voice muffled by his overcoat.

“Why? What are you afraid of?”

“Why did you come in here?” She whispers, finally wrapping her arms around him, trying furiously to quell the tears.

“I’m here for you.” He holds her for another moment; she can feel his breath as it stirs the hair on the side of her head. And then he whispers, “Come back to me.”

\---

He wants to hold her and kiss her as much as she does him, she can see that. But this is neither the time, nor the place. There are still five excruciating hours to get through before the end of the work day, so they agree to meet for dinner at a restaurant. He suggests one, and she shrugs; it’s another name she doesn’t recognize.

And then his arms are around her again, his hand burying itself in her hair and ruining her bun, pulling her head back ever so slightly. And he’s staring at her again, with those eyes that peer at her from dreams and nightmares alike, staring at her as though she’s going to disappear from his life again.

“I’m sorry,” she says, and he knows what she means.

“It’s all right. But,” he frowns, “you never answered me.”

“What?”

“What are you so afraid of?”

She bites her lip as she struggles to articulate what she’s feeling, to spin the wild, dark, gaping emotions into mere words.

He bends his face down toward her (and the cashier is  _ really _ getting uncomfortable, but that’s neither here nor there) and presses his forehead against hers, the hand in her hair moving to cup her cheek. His expression is gentle with understanding.

“How can you think that I would leave you?” He murmurs.

_ Because everyone else has. _

“Can’t you see that I could never leave you, even if I tried?” He continues. “Don’t you feel it? This...this thing we share. This bond.”

Rey’s tears finally flow over then. He wipes them away, the calluses on the pads of his fingers rough against the delicate skin under her eyes.

“I’ll never leave you, Rey,” he says with quiet, ferocious conviction, and Rey almost lets herself believe him.

\---

She agrees to drop off her car at her apartment and meet Ren at the entrance to his apartment building, so that they can drive over together. The first time she climbs into his car, she immediately feels inadequate. It’s silly, feeling unworthy of a car, but his is so nice, so well-loved and well-maintained that she feels like an intruder of the lowest class.

They park on the street by a hole-in-the-wall restaurant. Rey wonders if she’s underdressed in her customary jeans and sweater, but it’s Ren who appears overdressed in the restaurant’s cramped, slightly quirky, decidedly casual ambience. They’re seated, their orders taken, and when the food arrives, it’s more delicious than Rey expected.

But the details of the dinner are a swimming mass; she’s only able to pay attention to the sensation of being back in Ren’s presence, of the sight of his hands, his hair, his eyes, his soft, crooked mouth. He rarely takes his eyes off of her, even when he’s eating. As they drive back, he reaches his free hand over the transmission shifter to take hers, and even though this isn’t the first time they’ve touched, the feel of his long fingers and his broad, warm palm engulfing her own small, thin hand is at once comforting and electrifying.

\---

He invites her up to his apartment, casually. She accepts, equally casually, and she’s unsure what she hopes will happen.

The door of his apartment closes behind him, and he steps toward her in one long stride and practically seizes her by the waist, and she finds herself engulfed once again in those arms. His hand finds its way to her hair again, and she feels the bun that she’s already had to fix earlier in the day come loose once again as he sinks his fingers into her hair and tugs, gently. He cranes his neck down and pins her with that stare, and she feels that deep-seated, entirely selfish need to be desired and pursued and held being exquisitely sated.

“Can I kiss you?” He asks, his voice barely above a growl. She manages to nod, her motions fluttery and jerky. He hefts her up into his arms and presses her back against the door, their shoes and coats and scarves still on, and presses not-at-all-chaste kisses to her woefully unprepared mouth.

Rey’s scrabbling at his shoulders, trying to hang onto him with her arms and legs, trying to keep up with his demanding mouth and tongue. She fists a hand in his hair, attempting to assert some control over the situation, and is rewarded with a groan.

Her lips flutter about his, trying to give what he’s giving right back to him, wondering if her inexperience is showing through, wondering if she’s perhaps using too much tongue, or maybe too little? Her cheeks burn with self-consciousness and embarrassment.

He pulls his head back a moment to stare at her fast-swelling lips and flushed cheeks, her mussed hair and hazy eyes.

“Let go,” he commands, and she understands what he means. He dips his head to her again, and she lets go, and he catches her as she falls.

\---

They’ve made their way to the sectional, lips on lips, pressed flush against each other, and when Rey feels Ren’s hands move in a way that is decidedly toeing a boundary, she releases his lips and withdraws her hands. Ren’s eyes snap open, and when he sees that she wants to stop, he eases off of her, and they fix their clothes and hair in a warm, if not slightly awkward, silence. 

He helps her tuck her hair back behind her ears, and keeps his hands in place afterward, gently cupping her face. There’s a strange tenderness in his eyes, something that’s unfamiliar to her.

“Cheesecake?” He says, and a cheeky grin breaks out across his face, and Rey can’t help but laugh. He slices and plates some of the leftover cheesecake as she picks up their discarded coats and shoes. They sit on the sofa (at his insistence; she’s worried that she’ll get crumbs and grease all over the leather, but he seems entirely unconcerned) and eat in silence, and the combination of being well-kissed and well-fed produces a feeling of contentment that buzzes pleasantly from the roots of her hair down to her toes.

\---

When she wakes up, the sky outside is pitch black, and Ren is asleep at her back, his arms clasping her to his chest, her body safely and neatly cocooned against his. She starts, the room and the sensations frighteningly unfamiliar for an instant, and wakes him.

“What happened?” She asks, panicked. Falling asleep at someone else’s place is not something she’s done in a long time.

“You fell asleep,” Ren deadpans, rubbing sleep from his eyes, one arm still curled securely around her.

“I’m so sorry,” she says hurriedly as she disentangles herself from him. “I can’t believe—did I fall asleep while we were talking?”

“It was late,” Ren says soothingly. “It’s all right.”

“What time is it?”

Ren pulls his phone from his pocket and squints at the too-bright screen. “Almost 2.”

Rey makes a vague, groggy sound as she stands. “I’ve got to get back.”

Ren looks up at her for a moment, his eyes unreadable. But he stands as well a moment later. 

“All right.”

He insists on walking her back, and they trudge through the bitter cold of the early morning in silence, their faces wrapped snugly against the biting wind. When they reach her apartment building, she unlocks the inner doors and stops halfway through the doorway to glance back at him, just as she did last time.

This time, he watches as the door swings shut behind her, and as she disappears down the hallway.

\---

They fall into a strange weekly schedule. Coffee—sometimes dinner—after work on some weekdays, usually Thursdays; simple breakfasts at her place on Saturday mornings; indulgent dinners at his place on Saturday evenings. Rey begins paying more attention to the state of her apartment and making sure that the door to her bedroom is firmly closed before he arrives, and Ren takes the opportunity of having a regular dinner guest to swear off working on weekends, devoting his time instead to researching and discovering recipes, shopping for groceries, pondering what to surprise Rey with next.

The first few weeks are awkward, intense, charged with unspoken feelings and thoughts, worries and practicalities, and—on top of all that—the strange dreams persist. But as they fall into the weekly routine, as Ren learns to expect Rey’s reticence and intense independence and as Rey learns to expect his searing intensity and his somehow simultaneous gentleness, the shapes that they make in each other’s lives begin to take more definite forms. Not quite friend, not quite lover… but something intimate nonetheless, something uniquely sacred. Their words with each other are honest, meaningful. Their touches and kisses are chaste yet deeply intimate, languorous, decadent; not the heated, almost animalistic mindless groping and tonguing that Rey always thought passion translated to. And the strange dreams that feel more like memories become recurring rather than new, and the strangeness of them begins to dull.

“I’m traveling out to Chandrila and then to Ahch-To next weekend,” Ren says as they nurse warm drinks at their usual Thursday evening coffee spot. “Come with me.”

“Back to making demands, I see,” Rey teases. “What happened to asking proper questions?”

“Like I said, I never claimed to be a gentleman.”

“No, I suppose not.” 

“So?”

Rey sighs. “I don’t know, Kylo. I mean, we certainly know each other better now than we did a few weeks ago, but there’s still the issue of company policy.”

“It won’t be a personal trip, not entirely,” Ben says, then clarifies, “I scheduled meetings with a few potential new customers out there, so it will primarily be a business trip for me. I may not have much time during the days to actually show you around… You’d be mostly on your own.”

“Ah. Are you going to be visiting your mother and uncle?”

Ren slants his eyes to the side for a moment. “Probably not.”

Rey’s followup question dies on her lips as she watches his face cloud over. “So,” she says, swiftly changing the subject, “we would mostly just be together when we’re on the road?”

“And during the day, I’ll be at my meetings while you get to explore the area.”

Rey sips at her tea, considering. It seems harmless enough; there seemed to be a relatively low possibility of someone from work seeing them together, and it would relieve Kylo of the burden of showing her around town, leaving her free to roam about independently.

“I think that actually sounds nice,” she says slowly.

Ren leans forward. “Really?”

“Why are you so surprised?”

“I was fully expecting another rejection.”

“Then why did you ask again?”

“Worth a shot, I figured.”

Rey grins one of her small, subtle grins at Ren from behind her mug of tea, and he finds himself arrested by the sight of her dimpled smile.

“I’m thinking about heading out Saturday morning,” he says. “It’s a two hour train ride to Hanna City. I have two meetings there, and then we can figure something out for dinner. For Sunday, I was thinking of driving from Hanna City to the Ileenium port and catching a ferry there to Ahch-To.”

“Wait, this is going to be an overnight trip?”

“Seems easiest that way, otherwise we’d have to double back at the end of Saturday and then take a four hour trip out to Ahch-To the next day.” He looks at her with concern. “Is that not okay with you?

“I…” Rey wrinkles her brow as she thinks through this. Making it an overnight trip does make a lot more logistical sense, now that she thinks about it. But…

“We don’t have to share a room, of course,” Ren says quickly. “We can even be at different hotels at opposite ends of the city, if you would prefer that.”

“I think I would prefer that,” Rey says quietly.

Ren directs his gaze down to his coffee for a moment. “Okay. That can be arranged.”

“Do you want me to prepare anything for the trip? Or arrange anything?”

“I can take care of transportation and hotel bookings,” Ren says, waving his hand dismissively at her objections. “And since you’ll probably have your own schedule, I’ll leave your trip planning to you.”

“A day in Hanna City, and a day in Ahch-To,” Rey says, her misgivings fading at the prospect of seeing the colorful city and the tiny island, her smile turning radiant. “I haven’t traveled outside of this city in so long.”

“Glad I could be of service,” Ren says with mock smugness.

Rey moves to sip more tea, but has a sudden thought. “Wait, did you say ‘train ride’?”

\---

It’s early Saturday morning, and the sun has only just begun to peek over the horizon when Ren steps out of a taxi at the remote train station that he and Rey agreed to meet at. He tips the driver, then slings his weekend bag over his shoulder, briefcase in hand, and strides into the station.

The tiny brick hut that serves as the train station is drafty and perfunctory, and a few people mill about inside, sitting on the benches, staring out of windows or at departure schedules on the screens. After quickly surveying the area and not finding Rey, he sits on the edge of a bench and listens to the heating system clanging valiantly.

The minutes tick by, and with every passing minute, Ren’s doubts about whether Rey will show up mount steadily. She agreed to the trip, it’s true, but she had seemed uncomfortable with the whole arrangement. Ren wonders if perhaps he pushed too hard for this trip to happen, and if Rey is now having doubts.

But then a public bus clatters to a stop at the lonely bus stop sign outside the entrance of the train station, and Rey, wrapped up in her woolens and winter coat and carrying a modest travel bag, hops off the bus into a snowdrift by the road. Ren watches as she steps gingerly out of the snow, makes quick work of the stairs, and pauses at the entrance of the station, searching the crowd with her eyes. He watches as her expression lights up the moment her eyes land on him, and he stores that moment away.

“I thought maybe you’d changed your mind,” Ren says, standing to meet her.

“What?” Rey scrunches her nose up in confusion. “Why would I do that?”

“I don’t know,” Ren lies. “I shouldn’t have doubted you.” He smirks down at her, and she beams up at him, and he stores that moment away, too.

Now that Rey has entered his life, he finds himself doing that more often—finding moments of pure contentment, quiet beauty and joy, and storing them away, as though saving up for the time when she will inevitably exit his life, taking all of the light with her.

“Are you really okay with going on this trip, though?” He presses. “Serious question.”

Rey nods. “Yes, I really am. Isn’t it a bit late to ask, anyway?”

“Good.” Ren takes their train tickets out of his pocket and hands her one of them. She gives the ticket a quick once-over, and he watches with satisfaction when her eye catches on a key phrase.

“ _ First class _ ?”

Ren grins widely. “Only the best.”

“But it’s not at all necessary,” Rey gripes. “It’s only a two-hour trip.”

“I insist,” Ren says. “Have you ridden first class on these trains before?”

“Of course not.”

“Well, then, you’re in for a treat.”

Rey’s widened eyes bounce helplessly between the ticket and Ren’s grin.

“Besides,” Ren adds, “there’s no way I’ll fit in the coach seats.”

“Ah.” Rey glances down thoughtfully at his long legs, and then back up at his face. “Well, you could have gotten me a coach seat and gotten yourself a first class seat.”

Ren’s smile goes slack. “Are you serious? What kind of person would I be if I did that?”

Rey shrugs, dropping her gaze again to the designation on her ticket. “I wouldn’t mind.”

“Yes, you would. And I would never do that to you.”

Rey looks up at him, her ticket clutched in both of her hands, and gives him another one of those small, heart-splitting smiles. He’s lost count of the number of times this girl has turned his knees to jelly, simply by fixing her eyes on him and turning the corners of her mouth up.

She’s slipping, he thinks. When they first met, she had been so incredibly good at walling him out of her mind, at controlling the expressiveness of her eyes, at being stingy with her smiles. Their inexplicable connection meant that he could see through it most of the time, but there were still moments of complete opaqueness, moments when he stared into her face and could discern nothing.

But now, after a few weeks, he can already see the difference; she’s more generous with her smiles, more open with her little gestures of affection, and more bold and relaxed and even a bit more talkative. With every passing day, she’s relinquishing a bit more of her fear of being unloved and abandoned, and allowing herself to cling a bit closer to him.

She’s slipping, and he relishes every inch that she gives. She’s slipping, and he grows more and more terrified of hurting her, and wonders if the same fear plagues her when they aren’t together, compelling her at every moment to draw away, to reestablish distance.

He reaches out and brushes at her cheek with his thumb. “I’m glad you’re making this trip with me,” he says quietly.

“I am too,” she says.

\---

Rey can’t begin to describe the satisfaction of having arm room and leg room and being able to recline her seat on a train. Ren watches with faint amusement as she stretches herself out as far as she can, arching her back and waving her fisted hands in the air above her head.

“I’m heading to the food cart,” he says. “Do you want me to pick anything up for you? Or maybe you want to come along?”

Rey’s eyes snap up to his face, and she masters her features almost instantly. “Oh, I’ve already eaten breakfast.”

Ren looks down at her impatiently for a moment. “How does a breakfast sandwich sound?”

“No, really, I—”

“Rey, we both know that a couple handfuls of cereal isn’t going to last you halfway through the morning,” Ren deadpans, and Rey blushes, irritated.

“What I  _ choose  _ to eat is none of your business,” she bites back.

“Okay,” Ren says, “breakfast sandwich it is.” He hightails out of the train car before she can protest.

\---

An egg-and-bacon sandwich and a fruit yogurt parfait later, Rey is sipping contentedly out of a tall to-go cup of green tea and nibbling at a freshly-baked blueberry muffin, and Ren is watching her from across the tiny table between them, trying and failing to hide his smirk. The train is now cutting through a cast stretch of silent snow-blanketed farmland, skirting along several larger provinces to head straight for Chandrila. The sun has climbed a bit higher, and its light shines a bit surer.

Rey has many different types of silences, Ren has discovered. More often than not, she’s lying in wait, trying to get a feel for a situation before acting. Other times, it’s a tense, brooding silence, where all of her attention is focused inward, and she’s contemplating something that no one else has a right to witness.

This silence is neither of those. Neither inward nor outward in particular, neither tense nor calculating, this silence is calm, peaceful, almost passive. She’s finding pleasure and peace in the moment, and is content to let it unfold. She takes another sip of the tea, her painfully thin wrists sticking out of her sleeves, and her smile rivals the sun.

\---

They arrive at the central station in Hanna City a few hours before lunchtime. Ren, still familiar with the city, is able to navigate fairly easily. He rents a car, drives her around to some of the attractions on her list, takes her to lunch. The restaurant is perched at the top of a corporate building and serves flavors and textures that are as breathtaking as the view. Rey insists that they sit by the window, and her stomach flips with adrenaline as she presses herself against the glass to peer down as far as she can manage to see.

Hanna City extends around them for miles, and seems to be in a perpetual state of controlled chaos. The innumerable buildings in the city vary drastically in shape, size, material, architectural influences, all crowding along shoveled, immaculately-paved streets, which themselves seem full to the brim with the flashiest of cars, and men and women dressed to the nines. Every street, it seems, offers several days’ worth of diversions, entertainment, food, shops and boutiques, salons and workshops, hotels and theaters. She’s able to make out the occasional pockets of greenery where parks and zoos have been squeezed. 

The corporate and tech districts are visible from the restaurant as well; Ren points them out to her, and explains that his two meetings in the afternoon will be in that area. The city’s train system weaves in and out of streets, above and below ground, and the squeaky-clean public buses trundle along in their respective lanes. There is so much life here, so much vibrancy and diversion, that Rey thinks she could sit on a bench and watch the city passing by around her for days on end without growing bored.

“Terrible, isn’t it,” Ren monotones as he stabs at his salmon meal.

Rey laughs. “It makes quite the first impression.”

“All the same, the sooner we can leave, the better.” He hands her a sheet of paper with a street address and number on it. “Here’s the hotel information. The booking should be under your name.”

“All right,” Rey says, glancing at the paper before tucking it away securely in her jacket pocket.

“I’ve made reservations for dinner for us, tonight at 8. It’s one of my old favorites.” He hands her another square of paper, which she pockets similarly.

“And you have my number, of course. Let me know if you need anything at any moment, and I’ll get to you as soon as I can.”

“I’m sure that won’t be necessary, but thanks.”

“And—”

“Kylo.”

“What?”

“I’ll be fine.”

\---

Rey makes quick work of the remaining things that she’s wanted to see, and allows herself the small indulgence of trying a beef bun at one of the city’s famed food stands (delicious, of course). It’s difficult to keep from taking photos of everything that catches her attention—the loveliness of the tiny park that she passes on her way to the local art micro-museum, the surprisingly elegant designs of the street lamps and signs, the tempting wares on display in the windows of various shops. 

After she checks off the last thing on her list (a memorial of a war hero, nestled in a lovely winter garden), she checks her phone and finds that she needs to start making her way to dinner. 

\---

Rey bursts in through the front doors of the restaurant, slightly out of breath, her face red from the exertion of speed-walking. The hostess’s gaze snaps around to her, and Rey watches as the woman gives her a once-over with mild disbelief, her bright-red lips pursed.

“Hi,” Rey attempts, ignoring the rudeness and stepping forward, all snow-caked boots and windblown hair. “I have a reservation here, under the name Kylo Ren.”

As the hostess runs her finger down the list of reservations for the evening, Rey feels a hand on her shoulder. She turns, fully expecting to see Ren, but is instead met with the sight of a diminutive, aging woman, dressed in elegant, neutral fabrics and clean lines, her long gray hair expertly braided and tucked away from her face, her eyes wise and, at the moment, wide.

“Excuse me,” she says in a low, polite voice, “but did I hear correctly just now? You’re here with Kylo Ren?”

“Um…” Rey draws away from the strange woman. “Who’s asking?”

“I’m sorry,” the woman says instantly, a tentative warmth rushing to her eyes. “I’m Senator Leia Organa. I’m Kylo’s mother.”

Rey remains at a slight distance from the woman, staring into her eyes, her face. The face that stares back is kindly, patient, and profoundly tired; her skin is pockmarked with age spots, and fine wrinkles line the stronger curves of her face, hinting at her smile lines and frown lines alike. And although she had first identified herself as a Senator, Rey can sense the mother in her, the instinctual warmth and openness and patience and forgiving nature, and for a moment, Rey’s heart crumples.

“Kylo never mentioned you by name,” Rey mutters, half-apologetically.

“I wouldn’t expect him to,” the Senator says matter-of-factly. “I take it you know that we’ve been estranged for the past few years?”

“Yes,” Rey says, still uncertain.

“And you are? His girlfriend?”

“No, no,” Rey says quickly. “I’m...I’m his co-worker.”

At this point, Rey remembers the hostess, and turns to see the red-lipped woman staring at the two of them with a combination of shock and annoyance.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Rey rushes to say.

“It’s all right,” the hostess says automatically, then leans around Rey to peer at Senator Organa with a wide smile. “Good evening, Senator. I’ll be right with you.”

As Rey follows the hostess to her table, she turns around to glance at the Senator, and only sees a hunched, aging woman, immaculately dressed and groomed, with a lifetime of grief etched into her face.

\---

When Ren finally arrives, he takes off his jacket and throws it over the back of his chair, apologizes for his lateness (the second meeting went over time), asks her if she’s ordered yet, and then notices her unease.

“What’s wrong?” He asks, then follows the line of her eyes.

The Senator has been seated at a larger table with her party, but she’s looking intently at them from across the room. Her eyes lock with Ren’s, and Rey watches as the blood drains from his face.

The Senator rises from her table, excusing herself quietly, and begins to make her way to their table.

“Rey,” Ren murmurs. “We need to leave.”

“No.” Rey grabs his wrist, and he turns his wide-eyed gaze to her, his displeasure clear on his face.

“She’s not coming here to antagonize you,” Rey insists.

“Oh, and suddenly you’re an expert on my  _ mother _ ?” Ren spits. But she isn’t surprised, or offended; the topic of his family has always been like an exposed nerve for him, and it’s a topic that she’s reluctantly avoided. Until now.

“Kylo, please just listen to what she wants to say. She seemed like she misses you.”

Their exchange has stalled him long enough for the Senator to draw near, and she stops a few feet away, bracing her hand on the back of a nearby chair.

“Ben?” She says, her voice dampened with emotion.

_ Ben? _

“Mother,” Ren returns, his voice slightly strangled-sounding.

“It’s good to see you,” the Senator says. Rey finds that she’s gripping the seat of her chair, and has to consciously uncurl her fingers, loosen her knuckles.

“Mother, I…” Ren’s mouth works silently as his Adam’s apple bobs. “I don’t think there is anything to say.”

“Ben,” she says gently, glancing at Rey self-consciously before continuing, “I know that your father would have wanted you to be at his funeral.”

And Ren snaps.

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” He glowers, his voice barely restrained.

“It means that he loved you,” the Senator says firmly. “And that I love you.”

“You don’t know what—what I—”

“Ben, I know your version of the story perfectly well.”

“ _ Stop calling me Ben! _ ”

Other patrons in the restaurant have started to turn and stare. Ren lowers his voice with difficulty.

“And I’m sure you know my ‘version’ of the story. Of course you do. You just can’t seem to think that maybe, just maybe, it’s the truth.”

“I know you,” the Senator says simply, her eyes glistening. “I know all of the darkness in you, but I also know the good that you’re capable of. The love. I know that you didn’t...that none of it was on purpose.”

“Mother,” Ren says, his face haggard. “Please. Not here.”

“Can I see you, then? Some other time, some other place?”

Ren turns to Rey. “We’re going. Now.”

“But—but the reservation—”

“Fuck the reservation,” Ren says darkly. “We need to go. Anywhere but here.”

“I’ll leave if you want me to,” the Senator hurriedly says. “I know this place is your favorite—”

“No, mother. Go back to your friends.” He doesn’t even look at his mother as he speaks. “Rey, we need to go.”

Rey stares at him, aghast.

“Please,” he says, and it’s a whispered plea, and Rey finally relents.

\---

Ren bundles Rey into the rental and speeds off, his eyes focused on the road ahead.

“What was that about?” Rey demands.

Ren’s hands are clenched around the wheel, his knuckles white. He doesn’t reply.

“Ben.”

His Adam’s apple bobs violently, but he still doesn’t look at her.

“You know that it’s pointless to hide these things from me,” Rey presses. “We know each other.”

“You know a lot less about me than you think,” Ren counters.

“Perhaps I don’t know the actual facts and details about the events in your life, yes. But I  _ know _ you. I know your character.”

“If you agreed to come on this trip with me, then you know much less about me than you realize.”

“I saw it in a dream,” Rey says, in a voice that isn’t much louder than a whisper.

Ren’s eyes flicker in her direction. “What did you see?”

Rey feels tears pricking suddenly at her eyes.

“Say it,” Ren whispers.

“I saw you kill a man.” It’s impossible to describe the beam of convulsing, crackling red light that Ren had been wielding in her dream, the horror and anguish she felt at the sight of the beam penetrating the abdomen of an aging man—a horror and anguish so great that it hadn’t felt like her own—and the ripple in the very fabric of reality that was tangible to her as the man fell into the gaping abyss. She hadn’t been able to see his face, but the grief that ripped through her was the grief that one felt in the passing of a loved one.

“He was… He was your father.”

“Then you know everything you need to know,” Ren says tightly.

“But it tore you apart. The death of your father changed you forever. It separated you from the people who loved you forever.” Rey leans toward him eagerly. “Don’t you see? It doesn’t have to be that way. The death of your father doesn’t need to define you for the rest of your life.”

“I’m a murderer, Rey!” Ren suddenly roars. He abruptly pulls the car over to the side of the highway and buries his hands in his hair, eyes wild. “I’m a murderer. There isn’t any way to change that. It’s too late. I’m already—” A sob tears its way out of Ren, a violent, visceral, unfamiliar thing.

Rey sits in the passenger seat, watching him pull desperately at his hair as the tears begin to escape his eyes. The dream had revealed to her the darkness in Kylo Ren, but it was another thing entirely to listen to him admit it.

“What happened, Ben?”

Ren cuts the engine and punches the hazard lights button. His face is hidden from Rey.

She unfastens her seatbelt and clambers over the transmission shifter, squeezing her limbs strategically around Ren’s massive body and holding him as best as she can in the driver’s seat.

“Ben,” she whispers, removing his hands from his hair with gentle fingers and smoothing the disturbed hair back into place. “Please, don’t shut me out.”

“You’ll leave me if I tell you.”

“I promise that I won’t.”

“You’ll change your mind. You’ll never look at me the same way again.”

“Ben,” Rey whispers, “I’ve always known what you are. And you’ve always known what I am. And neither of us have left each other yet.”

Ren’s head shifts, and she catches a glimpse of scarred skin and glistening dark eyes before he’s extending his arms and engulfing her with an embrace and a sigh.

“My poor lonely girl,” Ren murmurs into her neck. “Are you so lonely that you’d tolerate the company of a murderer?”

Rey tightens her arms around him, feeling as though she’s the only thing holding him together now. He shudders, and begins to tell his story.

\---

They were on a cruise, somewhere nice, somewhere tropical, somewhere with endless sun and an endless supply of pineapples and mangos; heaven on earth, really. But there had been a disagreement earlier in the day. Several, actually. They only seemed to know how to argue and yell and blame and ignore. They seemed to have forgotten how to love and accept and bridge and mend.

So it was one of many disagreements, all piling on top of each other, all adding to the pain and resentment that had already existed for years. It was their reality; there was no other reality to consider. This was what they did. This was what they were good at.

They were at the rooftop pool, and Leia was sitting in one of the pool chairs, her towel wrapped around her shoulders, her face buried in her hands. Ben’s father—Han Solo, his name was Han Solo—was standing at the edge of the pool, yelling passionately, and Ben was up in his face, returning his father’s vitriol in equal measure. Han had brought up the subject of Ben’s work responsibilities and the shadiness of his company’s processes, and Ben had in turn brought up Han’s equally-shady jobs in the past, and it had spiralled from there.

Leia had painstakingly organized the whole trip in hopes of restoring their broken family, or at least beginning that process. Things had begun civilly, but had escalated quickly. As they always did. And for the first time in their lives, things got physical as well.

Ben isn’t sure if his memory is reliable anymore. He isn’t sure who invaded the other’s personal space first, who pointed the first finger, who threw the first punch. But the next thing he knew, he had his father backed up against the flimsy railing surrounding the pool area, and they were screaming, and Leia was screaming—

And then Ben had shoved Han. Not particularly violently, and certainly not with any intention to kill. But Han, aging man that he was, lost his balance and tipped over the railing, too quickly for Ben to react. And Han was falling silently, as though the fact that he was falling hadn’t registered yet. And Han was hitting the curving side of the ship, and the sound was halfway between a crack and a crunch, and he was still falling, and falling, and Han hit the water.

And Han couldn’t swim.

\---

“When they got him out of the water, I couldn’t even recognize him at first,” Ren says, his voice raspy. “His face had this...expression. I can’t describe it. It was horrible.”

Rey can’t lie to herself. She’s afraid to look Ren in the eye. She’s afraid to let him see the expression on her face. She’s afraid that she will, after all, change her mind. She can’t ever imagine lifting a hand against a parent, no matter how angry she might be at them; she would give anything to have a father.

She holds Ren closer.

“Your mom knows about all of this, right? She was there?”

“Yes.”

“So she knows that it was an accident.”

“No one  _ knows _ that it was an accident, Rey. Not even me.”

“I think her reaction to seeing you today would have been a lot different if she thought you did it on purpose.”

“It’s too late,” Ren monotones, as if he’s repeating something he’s told himself many, many times. “I tore her life apart. I almost ruined her career. I made her endure years and years of ruthless hounding by the paparazzi. I took her  _ husband  _ from her. It’s too late for me.”

“Ben, I don’t think that’s a choice you can make on your own.”

“Rey,” he rasps, “don’t you see? I can’t bear her hatred and resentment, but I also can’t accept her forgiveness and love. There is no way for us to coexist anymore.”

“On the contrary, accepting someone's love and forgiveness is the easiest thing to do,” Rey counters firmly. “She loves you. She misses you. Why deprive her of the only family she has remaining when she’s already lost so much?”

“I once said to her face,” Ren says musingly after a beat of silence, “that I was ashamed of having her as a mother. That I wanted any mother other than her. And she gave back as good as she got.”

“Oh, Ben,” Rey says, and her heart splits under the weight of his and Leia’s pain.

\---

They collect themselves with a massive effort, and he picks up food for them at the nearest food stand before driving her to her hotel. They sit in the car, waiting for the several cars in front of them to empty out and drive away.

“Why did you never get adopted?” Ren asks abruptly. “You clearly crave a family.”

Rey watches as a mother climbs out of a car and lifts a sleepy, irritable toddler out of the backseat before tiredly shutting the door, and as the father drives off to find a parking spot. It's a mundane, dispassionate display, but it’s something Rey would give anything to experience, someday.

“I couldn’t bring myself to trust people who wanted to foster or adopt me,” she says instead. “I knew lots of other kids in the homeless crowd and the foster system, and their situations tended to get worse when they got adopted or shipped off to foster homes. Prime targets for abuse, trafficking… I decided I didn’t want to risk it.”

“It’s more than that, isn’t it.”

Rey swallows. “Yes.”

“What else, then?”

The cars in front of them have cleared out of the way, and Ren drives up to the entrance of the hotel. Rey can glimpse the interior now, the lush, elegant lobby area, the polished marble floor, the well-dressed attendants.

“I was placed at a foster home, once,” Rey says quietly, staring blankly at the opulence.

A pause. “What happened?”

“My… My foster father didn’t want me. He had social services pick me up one day after school.”

Ren shifts in his seat, outside of her peripheral vision. The tears that spring to her eyes are expected, but still humiliating and frustrating, and the trauma that she’s tried so hard to outrun closes in.

“People always leave you if you don’t leave them first,” she whispers. There it is: her lifelong mantra, her slow self-euthanization.

“I wouldn’t leave you,” Ren says quietly.

She opens the door and climbs out.

\---


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to all who have been leaving comments/kudos, y'all are keeping me going!

It’s early the next morning when Ren texts her, telling her that he’s on his way over to her hotel, that he’ll be there in about half an hour. Rey’s already up and dressed and cleaned up, so she heads down to the lobby to scope out the complimentary breakfast situation.

A surprisingly passable breakfast and a mostly-okay cup of tea later, she feels refreshed and ready to go. She runs upstairs to grab her backpack, checks out at the front desk, and parks herself outside the hotel entrance, ready and waiting.

Ren drives up to the entrance minutes later, right on time. She clambers into the passenger seat.

And the events of the past day creep back in, and an ambiguous silence takes hold of the car as he navigates to the interprovincial freeway.

“Did you talk to your mother?”

“No.”

Silence.

“Did you sleep well?”

“I slept okay.”

More silence.

Rey puffs a quiet sigh and turns her attention outside her window, focusing instead on the passing buildings and scenery.

\---

Their arrival at the Chandrila-Ileenium border is unmistakable; almost as soon as Chandrila’s flat, manicured stretches of land, neatly-shoveled sidewalks, and elegantly modern buildings and residences end, Ileenium’s unruly hills and tall, gnarled trees begin. Even on the freeway, the pavement is occasionally marred by rebellious tree roots and bursts of browned grass, and buildings are a rare sight.

And then, suddenly, the ocean is peeking at her from between the branches and brambles, and then the trees peel back from the side of the freeway to reveal a vast expanse of sparkling gray-green-blue water under a cloudless sky.

Even though the stilted, infrequent conversation in the car has been stifling and uncomfortable, Rey can’t suppress a gasp of delight as the ocean comes into view. She presses herself against the car door and drinks in the colors that she is so unused to seeing, her heart leaping with joy.

They arrive at the ferry terminal in good time. The “ticketing counter” is a small foldable table under a rickety wooden shelter, manned by a single old man wrapped in fading woolens who smiles at her and cautions her that they only accept cash. Rey’s digging around in her bag for the necessary money when Ren appears beside her and wordlessly offers the man a crisp fifty for their round trip ticket. Rey gives Ren a tentative smile of gratitude, and they turn away from each other abruptly afterward.

They have approximately fifteen minutes before the ferry will arrive, so Rey cuts her way down to the shallow beach adjacent to the docks. The waves, diminutive in an almost playful way, trundle up the beach and fan out over the colorful, water-smoothed pebbles before receding back into the ocean with a hiss. Rey gets as close as she can without wetting her boots and marvels at the sight, the sounds, the crisp, salty smell of the ocean, the feeling of the chilly ocean breeze as it tugs at her loose flyaway strands of hair.

She hears the crunch of pebbles behind her, and turns to see Ren making his way down the beach toward her, his expression uncertain. He holds two packets of trail mix and extends one of them to her, a silent peace offering. She takes it, never one to refuse food, even if it’s only been two hours since breakfast, and they snack in silence.

“Are you all right?” He asks between munches.

“Yeah. Are you?”

“I think so.”

Ren pours the remainder of his trail mix onto the palm of one of his large hands and stands there, looking down at the colorful M&Ms, the chunks of dried fruit, the crumbling nuts.

“I think of her often, you know,” he says quietly. “I think all the time about going back to her. I’d give anything…” He trails off, either unable to find the words or unable to utter them.

“I think it’s clear that she’s forgiven you, Ben,” Rey says softly. “The only thing that’s still holding you back now is you.”

His head droops another degree. “I know,” he murmurs.

\---

The sight of Ren’s expensive, well-maintenanced car parked on the unceremonious rustbucket that is the ferry is surprisingly hilarious. They are the only passengers on this early Sunday morning, and they have the entire ferry to themselves, with the exception of a sprightly young man named Dopheld (at least, that’s what Rey thinks the elderly man called him), who mans the ferry. He whistles tunes with unnerving accuracy, wrapped in faded woolens much resembling the ones the elderly man had been wearing, and keeps to himself in the wheelhouse.

Rey spends as much time as she can outside of the car, running from one side to the other and gazing out at the choppy waves with a childish enthusiasm, glancing over once in a while at Ren, who sits stiffly in the driver’s seat and stares back at her with a mixture of wonder and disapproval. When the cold air becomes truly unbearable, she skips over to the car and jumps into the passenger seat, slamming the door behind her quickly and letting out a small whoop.

“It’s freezing out there!” She exclaims cheerfully, her face all shivery and dimpled, her cheeks and nose rapidly turning red. Her enthusiasm almost makes Ren foolish enough to want to step out and experience the thrill for himself.

Almost.

Twenty minutes pass, and Dopheld shouts something at them and points at the horizon. Rey strains forward to see what he’s pointing at, and realizes that Ahch-To has just appeared on the horizon, a small jutting of rock that seems utterly insignificant from this distance. She watches as the island approaches and enlarges, and something about it is incongruously familiar, even though she knows she’s never been to Ahch-To before.

She turns to Ren. “It looks exactly like my island.”

He stares at her, incredulous. “Are you sure?”

“Positive. It sort of looks like a person’s profile, doesn’t it?” She tilts her head to the side and is able to make out, roughly, a brow, a nose, a chin. Ren follows suit and stares for a moment.

“Perhaps I saw it in a photo when I was very young,” Rey muses weakly. The coincidence is almost too much for her to handle. All those years of lying in bed, struggling and failing to fight the tears and the loneliness. It had been a counselor in the foster system who suggested that she try visualizing something calming when these feelings became too much to handle. She thought it was shit advice at first, to be honest, but when she tried it, and her mind grasped onto this lovely little island in the middle of a blue ocean under a blue sky, the beauty of it was usually enough to calm her down to the point of being able to fall asleep.

And now, they watch in silence as the island of her pain-fevered imaginations draws nearer and nearer, and Rey wonders if she’s finally gone off the deep end.

When the ferry docks and Dopheld calls out a friendly farewell, Ren drives off the ferry onto a barely-paved road and pulls into the first scenic stop. “Want to take a look around?” He asks.

Rey opens the door and steps out for a moment. The salty ocean air has already worked thoroughly into her hair, creating a sort of gritty textured feeling. The coldness of the air stings her eyes, the delicate skin of her cheeks, the back of her throat.

She gazes around. The island is covered in scraps of snow, surprisingly mostly still white, and what little grass is showing is the same color as the small patches of dirt that peek out. The smooth, muted shades of gray of the rocks dominate the color palette of the island, however; the island seems to allow very little in the way of fertile soil, and what few species of greenery do manage to eke out a living here do so while hugging the ground closely, latching onto the precious few patches of dirt, peeking out between rocks and from under pebbles. During this time of year, the green seems to have receded entirely from the island, but the familiarity of the island is still undeniable to Rey.

She looks down at where her boots are planted firmly on the rock. She squats down and touches the rock with her bare hand, as though the reality of it through her boots is insufficient. When she looks back at Ren, his face is unreadable, waiting.

Rey hurries back to the car.

\---

Ahch-To has one central town (or maybe it’s technically a village?) that has a grand total of two stop lights. Ren drives through one of them and turns off the main road to park in the lot of what must be the only business building on the entire island.

“My first meeting is in this building. I should be done around 1. Do you want to meet up for lunch, somewhere?”

“How many restaurants are on this island?” Rey asks jokingly.

“Two. Plus a cafe,” Ren deadpans.

“Goodness.”

“Want to meet at the burger place?” Ren gestures down and across the street at a flat, nondescript building. It has an entrance and windows typical of a burger joint, but is otherwise unremarkable. A single car clatters past them, the first car Rey’s seen on this island.

“Sure,” she agrees.

Ren checks his watch. “Winter in Ahch-To isn’t fun, and sucks most of the life out of everything around here, but hopefully you can find some way to enjoy this place.”

“I will,” Rey assures him, grinning. She watches as he strides into the business building, then turns and starts on her way down the street and out of town.

\---

The rest of the island is mostly deserted, and Rey immediately begins to have second thoughts about wandering about on this island without company. She’s mostly in luck, though; she only runs into a few people on foot and one in a dilapidated car, and most of them were borderline geriatric. They seem friendly in general, smiling and waving at her in passing, displaying only mild signs of surprise at seeing an unfamiliar face.

The island seems to have large swaths of uninhabited land, and Rey wonders if she’s technically trespassing as she happily follows the dirt-and-stone road, occasionally veering off the path to investigate an interesting rock formation or to peer at the ocean from afar.

Eventually, the road she’s following leads her back to the edge of the island, and she picks her way down the steep rocky hill to the meager pebble beach below. The rocks are slightly slick from the spray of the ocean, but she thinks nothing of it, and finds a large enough rock on which to perch. From her somewhat comfortable spot, she watches the waves as they crash and pull at the pebbles, sending the smaller ones skittering over the larger ones, and a sense of calm blankets over her.

She’s awakened from her reverie by the sudden realization that, within the past few minutes, the height and power of the waves has increased dramatically. The next wave crashes closer to her toes, and the one after that drags a bit at the toes of her boots.

Rey feels a dark, paralyzing numbness, a complete lack of desire to get up and move out of the way. A vision—a memory?—flashes before her eyes—an underground lake, its opaque, unnervingly still surface like polished aluminum in the ground of the cave, and behind her, a vision, a beckoning, a _whisper_ —and she watches, unmoving, as the waves crowd in closer and closer— _she looks into the lake, and sees Ren’s searing gaze, and she looks harder, and she sees herself_ —and now the waves are tugging at the tops of her boots, now at the fabric of her jeans—

“HEY!”

Rey starts and looks up. A man is standing at the edge of the road, waving frantically at her.

The next wave clocks her on the back of her head, and she tumbles back against the rocks. The man’s cries are muffled by the ice-cold rushing water, and she flails about blindly, trying to find anything to hold onto as the water begins to recede back into the ocean at an alarming speed.

“CLIMB!” He yells as another wave approaches. Rey turns, willing herself to focus on getting herself back up to the road, and scrabbles at the wet freezing rocks.

“The rocks are too wet,” she cries, panicking. Her fingers are already stiffening from the iciness.

“If you don’t climb out now, the tide is going to drag you out into the ocean!” He shouts. Rey grits her teeth, knowing that he’s right. The survivor in her resurfaces. She doesn’t quite know how she does it, but she somehow manages to drag herself out of the next wave’s reach. She’s been an adept climber ever since she was a child; she’s scaled worse than icy wet rocks. She repeats this to herself as she zeroes in on the rocks before her, on testing and latching to the grooves and ridges, on pulling herself up with her arms while pushing with her legs—

And then she’s within a feet or two of the edge of the road, and she’s stumbling along as the ground flattens out, and the man has her by the arm, half-dragging her the rest of the way.

“What were you thinking?” He keeps demanding as he lets her down onto the ground and watches, crouching next to her, as she gasps for breath. He notices her shivering and chattering teeth before she does, and stands back up, beckoning.

“Come,” he says. “My place is right over there. You can dry off and have a cup of tea.”

The dangers of following a stranger into his house flee from Rey’s mind at the thought of a towel and a piping hot cup of tea, and she struggles to her feet, her appendages now useless frozen blocks. The man slings her arm over his shoulders and hoists her along as best as he can manage, and the two of them struggle a bit further down the road to a tiny hut made entirely of rock.

“Inside,” he encourages her as they struggle up the steps and he pushes open his door. “Come on in… That’s it. Chewie, _down_. Sofa’s over there. Let me get you a towel.” He leads her to the one sofa in the tiny, cramped living area, gently pushing a large brown dog to the side as he does so, and rushes off to find a clean towel.

Ignoring the old man’s admonishments, the dog Chewie rushes up to the stranger and happily covers her freezing face with warm dog saliva. Rey doesn’t have the energy to rebuff his affections, and maneuvers around his enthusiastic greetings to remove her boots, and is in the process of struggling with the zipper of her jacket when the man bustles back into the living room.

“Here,” he says, placing the towel on the sofa arm; then, “Chewie, _no_ ,” as he gently drags the dog over to the edge of the room; then, “Let me help you with that,” as he perceives her inability to handle the zipper. He helps her remove her jacket and takes it, along with her boots, over to the fireplace to dry.

_The fireplace!_ Rey drags the towel around her shoulders and makes her way over to the fireplace, dropping onto the rug in front of it clumsily with a shuddering sigh. Chewie follows her and flops down on the ground next to her, throwing his not-insignificant weight (and warmth) against her, panting happily. The man moves to detach Chewie from her again, but she shakes her head with a jerky smile. At the moment, the warmth of the dog is more than welcome.

“Do you want a change of clothes?” The man asks, sympathetic, after watching her settle in.

Rey shakes her head no, unable to make her mouth form words. Her jacket seems to have taken most of the beating; the rest of her clothes are fairly, surprisingly, dry.

“Let me get you that tea, then,” he replies, and he’s off again. Rey scoots over to her jacket where it’s hanging by the fireplace and rummages around in the pockets, retrieving her wallet and phone and laying them out to dry. Thankfully, nothing seems seriously damaged; her phone case seems to have saved her phone from shorting out, and the contents of her wallet are still mostly dry. 

Chewie sticks close by, and is just discovering that her shoulder makes for a good chin rest when the man walks back in, carefully balancing a cup of tea on a faded saucer.

“Here you go,” he says kindly, bending down slightly to hand her the tea. Cup and saucer exchange hands without incident, and Rey, wrapping her freezing fingers around the cup, sips at the piping-hot drink, and is unable to suppress a sigh of contentment.

The dryness of the fire and the warmth of the tea and the dog restore Rey within the hour. She presently notices that the man is, in fact, quite far along in age, sporting a scraggly gray beard and spiderweb wrinkles at the corners of his bright blue eyes, and she learns that the man’s name is Luke, and that he’s been on this island for a long time; roughly fifteen years, now.

“What were you doing down there?” He asks in an admonishing tone. “You must not be a local, if you didn’t know how quickly the tides change.”

“No, I’m not from around here,” Rey says, smiling ruefully. “I’m traveling with a friend, and I just thought visiting Ahch-To would be fun.”

“Fun!” Luke widens his eyes in mock astonishment. “Missy, there is absolutely nothing to do on this rock.”

“No,” Rey agrees, “but it’s beautiful here.”

Luke glances out his window for a moment, looking out across the ocean, and the corners of his eyes crinkle momentarily. “So it is,” he agrees. “How did you hear of this place?”

“I don’t remember how, exactly,” Rey replies. “I think it was several years ago when I first heard of this place. A...a friend mentioned that he was going to be coming out here, and I figured I’d tag along.”

“Anyone I’d know?”

“Maybe? He says he spent a few years here with his uncle.”

Luke’s eyes find hers again. “What’s his name?”

“Oh, uh… Kylo Ren?”

Rey isn’t sure how to interpret Luke’s expression. “I think,” she says hesitantly, “that his name might have been Ben, at some point? If that’s helpful?”

“Ben is here?” Luke says in a tone that is a mix between hope and dread.

“You know him too?”

“I…” Luke sits down heavily on the sofa, and for the first time since Rey met him, Luke looks old. “I’m his uncle.”

“Oh.”

The silence that grows between them is deafening.

“Luke, I…” Rey swallows, unsure of what words are appropriate in this situation. “I don’t know a whole lot about what happened, but...Ben did tell me a bit. About his...problems with...family.”

“I see.”

“Actually, I don’t really know what his feelings toward you are,” Rey babbles; “His feelings about his parents are pretty clear, but he hasn’t talked about you much.”

“That so.” Luke shifts in his position on the sofa, then, with a sigh: “Well, I can’t say we parted on terrible terms, but Han’s death drove a wedge between all of us for a long time. How is he doing?”

“He’s…” Rey trails off, thinking about the past few weeks, then about the past day. “He’s mostly doing pretty good.”

“I see.” Luke looks at her thoughtfully for a moment. “Do you suppose he’d...be willing to…?”

“I can’t be sure, but I don’t think so,” Rey says gently, and Luke looks away.

“Well,” Luke says after another long pause, turning to her with a tired smile on his face, “and how do you fit into all of this, Rey? Are you his girlfriend?”

“No, no,” Rey says quickly, letting out a nervous, graceless giggle. “No, we’re…just friends.”

“I imagine Ben doesn’t open up to many people.”

“No, he certainly doesn’t.”

“And yet you seem to have gotten under his skin, somehow.”

“I...suppose?”

“Well,” Luke says kindly, “I think I can see why he might like you. I’m just glad that he has a friend, and that he’s doing okay. Perhaps,” he says haltingly, “someday we will all be reconciled.”

“It _is_ possible,” Rey urges. “Don’t give up hope.”

Luke murmurs an agreement, the outer corners of his eyes crinkling again. He turns to look out the window again, his eyes distant, and Rey has the sense to stay silent.

\---

By the time 1 rolls around, Rey has thanked Luke and left his hut with his well wishes, fully restored, and has made her way around the rest of the island. Even though the view and the scenery remains largely unchanged on all sides of the island, and even though the cold wind nips continuously at her cheeks and nose, she finds that she has enjoyed herself immensely. When she sits down across from Ren at a table in the restaurant, he sees a vivacity in her eyes and a color to her face that is entirely unfamiliar.

“Had a good morning, I see,” he says to her by way of greeting.

“Yes, I did,” Rey responds, practically beaming. “How was yours?”

“Terrible,” Ren monotones, picking up the menu to examine it.

“You seem to have that opinion about lots of things.”

“Mm.”

“What was so terrible?”

“Oh, just…” Ren trails off, waving his free hand in the air. “Dealing with execs who don’t actually know the workings of their company, and yet behave like they somehow deserve to be in charge.”

“The meeting was done on time, though?”

“Yeah.”

“And the outcome was...favorable?”

“You mean, the contract was signed? Yes,” Ren concedes, smiling.

“That sounds like a good meeting to me,” Rey chides cheerily, and Ren is powerless against her good mood.

“You didn’t tell me,” Rey admonishes him after their food arrives, “that the tide comes in fast on this island.”

“Oh,” Ren says absently as he stuffs another bite of burger into his mouth; then, “Oh!” as realization dawns on him, his eyes widening with alarm.

“Yeah,” Rey says ruefully.

“Did something happen?” Ren asks urgently as soon as he has sufficient room in his mouth.

“No. I went down to the edge of the water and got knocked around by a wave, but someone helped me get away from the water.”

“Who helped you?”

Rey gives him a look.

Ren frowns, puzzled, as he lifts his cup of water to his lips, then freezes as realization dawns on him again. “Wait,” he says, setting the cup down, “are you saying that…?”

“Met your Uncle Luke, yep. Oh, and Chewie.” Rey takes a bite out of her burger.

“Are you doing this on purpose?” Ren groans, burying his face in his hands.

“You know that I’m not,” Rey says.

“What did he say?”

“He asked how you were doing. I just said that you were...doing good. Chewie’s a great dog.”

“What else?”

“He said that he still hopes for reconciliation. Chewie liked using my shoulder as a chin rest.”

“Did he hurt you at all?”

“What? No! And Chewie is doing just fine, thanks for asking.”

Ren looks down at his burger silently. 

“He doesn’t wish you any harm, Ben,” Rey says eventually, carefully. “He only wants what your mom wants: to talk, and to reconcile.”

Ren looks away and takes another bite of his burger.

\---

“So,” Rey says when they are bundled up in the rental, having just left the ferry and waved goodbye to Dopheld and the elderly man still manning their respective positions, “how did you survive on Ahch-To all those years, anyway?”

“What do you mean?”

“I _mean_ that there is absolutely nothing to do on that rock. How did a young boy survive such an isolated place?”

Ren chuckles. “I think spending my earliest years in Chandrila gave me a permanent distaste for crowded cities and just overstimulation in general.”

“So Ahch-To was a welcome reprieve?”

“You could say that. I can see why people would find Ahch-To to be dull, but it really is very beautiful and peaceful. I took classes online to keep up with my education, supplemented by whatever my uncle felt like making me read… And in my free time, I was playing outdoors, or helping some of the older people with their daily needs. Tending gardens, fixing up things around the house, walking dogs. That sort of thing.”

“That does sound nice,” Rey says, a tad wistfully.

“It was. I’ll always remember my time here fondly.”

“I’m sure Luke thinks fondly on the time you spent together, too.”

Ren looks thoughtful. “I guess I don’t doubt that,” he finally says. “But a lot has changed since then.”

“Ben, I—”

“Why do you call me Ben?”

“Leia called you Ben.”

“I haven’t been Ben in a long time.”

“Would it be so bad to be Ben again?”

Ren steals a glance at Rey. “There are a lot of emotions attached to that name.”

“Would you prefer I not call you that, then?”

“For now. Please.”

“All right,” Rey says softly.

\---

“Where does your name come from?” Ren asks suddenly as they cross the border back in Chandrila.

“What?”

“Your first and last name. Rey Niima. You said you’re an orphan, right? Did your parents name you?”

“Oh. They left a name tag attached to my carrier. The tag had my first name and birthday; no other information. I was without a legal last name for a few years, which was fine. But I was advised that not having a legal last name could cause various issues down the road, with passports and driver’s licenses and the like. So I just picked the name of a city in the province where I was living.”

“Niima, Jakku? You’re from Jakku?”

“I’m honestly impressed that you knew that Niima was a city in Jakku.”

“It’s hardly a city.”

“I won’t disagree.”

“So, Miss Rey Niima of Jakku—”

“Kylo!” Rey’s shout makes Ren nearly veer off the road.

“Rey, what the hell—”

“ _Look!_ ” She points ahead of them, down the arrow-straight highway, and Kylo sees it—a barely-intact car on the other side of the road, with debris covering the ground around it, and a semi truck parked about twenty feet from it, its emergency lights on, its bumper and nose severely dented. The truck driver’s door is open, and as they near the site, Rey sees that a burly man—presumably the truck driver—is running as fast as he can towards the totaled car.

“We’ve got to stop and help them,” Rey says, and Ren pulls over on the side of the road without hesitation. He hits the emergency lights, and they get out of the car, and they’re running across the highway toward the crash site.

Someone is screaming from inside the car; a woman’s voice, Rey realizes. The passenger’s side has clearly taken the hit, and the door is smashed in, crumpled from the impact like a sheet of paper. The car is leaning alarmingly on one side, one of its wheels up in the air. Rey sees someone flailing in the driver’s seat, and a second person slumped over in the passenger’s seat.

“Someone call for emergency help,” the truck driver bellows to no one in particular as he rushes toward the car.

“I’ve got it,” Ren yells, fumbling for his phone.

“You get the driver,” Rey shouts to the trucker. “I’ll see about the passenger door.” The trucker nods, looking almost grateful to be told what to do. He opens the driver’s door and gives the screaming driver a quick once-over, his own panic rising.

Rey pulls at the passenger door, checks in the window to make sure that it’s unlocked, then looks up and realizes that she recognizes the driver.

“Rose!?” She shouts through the mangled window in disbelief.

“Rey,” and Rey’s name is a sobbing and drawn-out wail in Rose’s mouth. There is a mighty gash on Rose’s forehead and blood is trickling steadily from it, and other bloodstains run like patchwork across Rose’s jacket and pants.

“Rey, help Paige,” Rose cries thickly as the trucker finally works her seatbelt free and begins to lift her gently from the driver’s seat. “Help Paige!”

Rey finally looks at the unmoving form in the passenger’s seat and sees a tall, thin Asian woman with blood splattered across her lovely face, her glossy black hair pulled back in a neat ponytail, her head lolling to one side, her eyes lowered and unblinking. Rey looks down and sees that Paige’s leg is trapped between the door and the seat, and her arm is bloodied. Rey works the passenger side door again, and is finally, miraculously, able to get it open, but is unprepared for the sudden slump of Paige’s lifeless body into her arms.

“Paige?” Rey whispers to the unfamiliar, dead girl.

\---

They’re at a hospital in Chandrila, Rey and Ren and the trucker (whose name, according to his employee badge, is Temmin Wexley), sitting in the waiting area, bathed in sterile LED light, surrounded in a sea of carefully selected blue-greens, beiges, whites. Rose is being treated in some room, somewhere. Paige is in the morgue, her body arranged lovingly by the hospital staff, her eyes closed for her, her lovely, painless face washed and covered by a white sheet.

Rey has scrubbed her hands and arms and neck, but traces of Paige’s blood have worked their way into her cotton jacket, and Rey isn’t sure if they will ever come out. She realizes that she is trembling when Ren reaches over and pulls her against him to still her.

Temmin buries his face into his hands and lets out another sob. “It must have been ice on the road,” he croaks. “They were coming down the other lane, and they just swerved into in front of me all’a sudden, and I couldn’t...I couldn’t stop in time,” and another sob rips out of him. The pain and guilt and helplessness bear down on him, and he seems to feel the physical weight of it, hunched forward in his seat. His unsuccessfully choked-back sobs draw the stares and whispers of strangers in the waiting room.

Ren reaches out a hand and pats him mechanically on the back. “It’s all right,” he says in a soothing tone. “It’s all right.”

Rey leans over and puts a hand on Temmin’s knee, wishing she could do more. He doesn’t seem to notice it. “Paige… She’s dead,” he moans.

“It’s all right.”

“I _killed_ her.”

“It’s all right.”

\---

By the time they make it back to Ren’s apartment, it’s well past midnight. Rey follows Ren into his apartment, and he turns the shower on for her. When he wonders why the shower is taking so long, he walks cautiously into the bathroom, surprised to find the door unlocked, and finds her crouched against the wall of the shower, her arms wrapped tightly around herself, the hot water running over her small naked form, her sobs quiet and muffled by the water.

“Rey,” he murmurs as he turns the water off and lifts her out of the shower, averting his eyes as much as he can while wrapping her in a clean towel. “Rey, sweetheart.”

“She was lovely,” Rey cries. “It’s crazy, but it’s all I can think about. The blood looked like jewels, like flower petals. She looked like she was going to look up and smile at me.”

“Rey,” Ren whispers soothingly as he dries her face with a corner of the towel. “It’s going to be okay.” He lifts her into his arms effortlessly and carries her to his bed. “It’s going to be okay.”

“It’s _not_ ,” she cries, her hands fisting in the front of his shirt, her tears flowing over afresh. “She’s dead.”

“I know.”

“Why do people leave us, Ben?”

Ren sits on the edge of his bed and holds Rey close to his chest, her wet hair pressing coldly against his jaw. “I don’t know, sweetheart,” he says mournfully.

“Please,” Rey sobs, “please.”

Ren holds her tightly as she pleads for nothing in particular, to no one in particular. She sobs and sobs until eventually she cries herself to sleep.

\---


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to all who have been commenting/kudo-ing! You all have been so kind, and I really hope that you guys are still enjoying this. 
> 
> Warning: this is the penultimate chapter, and it might hurt a little.

_ He is veiled by darkness, sheathed in it like a weapon, striding in it. He is its harbinger, its executioner, its slave. Death unfurls from his lips when he speaks, death descends upon the victims of his crackling red blade. _

Rey dreams of a hellscape, and, standing in it, a row of figures shrouded in black cloaks, their faces covered by black helmets and tinted visors, their weapons rusty with use and dripping steaming blood in the snow… She sees, at their head, a figure wearing a black domed helmet with scratched strips of metal lining the visor, a monster that wields a crackling crossguard blade of red light, its volatile, indiscriminately destructive power mirroring that of its master.

_ He wields darkness. _

He turns his head sharply towards her, and even though his eyes are hidden, she can feel the burn of his gaze. Even at this distance, he seems to loom over her and crowd her in; she can feel the inhuman rage that propels him; she can feel all of his unmitigated power, his searing hatred and his deadly purpose, zeroing in on her. She turns and runs, her scream swallowed up by the night.

_ He exhales darkness. _

The waking and dream worlds begin to blur, and she finds herself caught in feverish, panicked thoughts as she flies through the forest.  _ He’s killed Han. He’s killed Paige. He’s killed Luke. And now he’s going to kill me. _

_ He  _ is  _ darkness. _

\---

Rey wakes with a start in an unfamiliar bed. She stumbles out of it, one of the sheets wrapped haphazardly around her. The acrid stench of fear and death from her dream seems to linger in the air. She flings the curtains open, and sunlight streams directly into her face.

_ Sunlight? _

She hurries out of the bedroom, sheet still in tow, and is immediately hit again, this time with the smell of breakfast. In the kitchen, she finds Ren fully dressed, scrambling eggs and smearing butter on toast. He looks up at her, and his smile is tentative.

“Good morning,” he says, eyeing her half-dressed, tousled appearance.

Rey pulls the sheet closer. “Morning,” she mutters, still disoriented and unsettled, trying to dissociate the Ren of her nightmare from the Ren currently plating toast. “Today’s Monday?”

“I called in sick for both of us.”

“Oh.”

She sits at the counter, and he lays a plate of eggs, buttered toast, and seared sausage before her. “Are you all right?” He asks quietly.

She takes his proffered fork and begins digging in, only then realizing how hungry she is. “I’m fine,” she says between chews. “Still a bit shaky, but better.”

“Sure?”

“Yeah.”

“I got a call from the hospital this morning,” Ren says, later, as Rey finishes up her food. “Rose is going to be all right.”

“That’s good.” She doesn’t ask for any details; she doesn’t ask about Temmin; she doesn’t want to know. Rey swallows her last bite and looks up at Ren, meeting his gaze for a moment. Her dream from the previous night seems too fantastical and... _ nightmarish _ to be rooted in any scrap of reality. But after holding Paige’s dead body and listening to Rose’s anguished screams, and after learning about Han’s death, Rey finds that her impression of Ren is now stained around the edges with darkness and death.

“I have to head home to feed my cat,” she says opaquely.

Ren nods tightly and watches as she pads back into the bedroom to get dressed and collect her things. He watches as she emerges from his room, still tousled and a bit groggy, but determined to leave. He watches as she opens the apartment door and steps out, her eyes flitting to his for a moment before the door closes behind her.

\---

Ren isn’t sure how much time passes. He’s still sitting in the kitchen, leaning over the now-cold breakfast with his face buried in his hands, when the front door buzzes. He turns on the intercom.

“Hello?”

“Be—… Kylo?”

Ren leans his head against the wall beside the intercom. “Rey.”

“Hi.” Rey’s voice is small. “Can you let me up?”

Ren punches the unlock button, and a minute later, there is a timid knock on his door. He opens it and finds Rey standing there, a conflicted expression on her face.

“I’ve fed BB8,” she says lamely.

“Good.”

“I’m not all right.”

“I’m not either.” 

He steps back to let her in. Rey glimpses the plate of untouched food sitting on the kitchen counter.

“You haven’t eaten?”

“...No.”

“It’s been two hours, Kylo.”

“Has it?” He says emptily.

Rey moves soundlessly to Ren’s kitchen and pops the plate of untouched food into his microwave. When the microwave dings, she retrieves the plate and brings it to his sofa, motioning for him to sit down next to her.

“What’s wrong?” She asks as she spears some food with the fork and holds it up to his mouth. Ren, huffing with indignation, takes the fork and feeds himself.

“This trip was a lot more than I thought it was going to be,” he finally says in between chews.

“No shit.”

“A lot more...pain and trauma.”

“Yeah,” Rey says quietly.

“I’m sorry,” Ren mutters. “I would have never invited you on this trip if I’d known...if I’d had any inkling…”

“How could you have known? None of it was your fault.”

“I guess the...the incident with Rose and Paige was...something else entirely. But I don’t know what I was thinking, taking you anywhere near my family. I guess I banked on my mother being too preoccupied with politics to be going out to dinners, and my uncle being too old and grumpy to be outside of his house at all, but...” He throws up his hands. “I was wrong on both accounts.”

“It’s all right. I think I enjoyed meeting them.”

“Can’t imagine why.”

“I feel like I got to know you a lot better through meeting them.”

“Ah, so you enjoyed listening to all the ways I’ve fallen out with my family,” Ren says bitterly.

“That’s not what I meant,” Rey says gently. “I enjoyed getting to know you, because I want to be closer to you. Because I care about you. And who doesn’t want to know more about someone they care about?”

Ren breaks eye contact with her and shoves sausage into his mouth aggressively.

“I don’t judge you for any of it,” Rey says. “I hope you know that.”

He pauses and glances at her, his generous mouth still full of sausage, and Rey cracks a grin. She thinks that perhaps, in moments like this, she can forget about the darkness that seems to enshroud him, the aura of death that seems to trail behind him, wherever he goes.

\---

Rey is running freshly-received packages from the loading dock to their respective storage shelves when her phone trills in her back pocket. Other folks in the warehouse shoot her a look; ignoring them, she puts down the box she’s currently holding and fishes her phone out of her pocket.

It’s an unsaved number, but she knows it by heart; the shelter where she was left as an infant. 

Unsure of what to make of it, Rey jogs to the break room.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Rey?”

It’s a voice Rey hasn’t heard in a long time. 

“...Bazine?”

“Yeah, me. How’re you doing?”

“Oh, uh, fine. How are things?”

“Lovely awesome fabulous, thank you. So you’re probably wondering why I’m calling.”

“Yeah?”

“So Rey. I have good news. There’s been an update on the identity of your parents.”

Rey nearly throws her phone across the room. “ _ What _ ?”

“We’ve just turned up a lead in your case. Turns out there was a mix-up in the paperwork they filled out when they took you in. Your parents left a note, but it was filed with another kid’s paperwork by accident.”

“... _ What _ ?”

“Crazy, I know, right? Anyway, the kid we thought the note had been with just found her real parents, and they distinctly remember choosing  _ not  _ to leave a note, which is what raised the red flag for us. We did a bit of digging and realized the note we thought was left with her was probably left with you.”

“...I...how…?”

“It’s a lot to take in, I know. Would you like to meet up someplace after work, maybe?”

“Oh, I…” Rey covers her face with her free hand. “I’m not in Jakku anymore. I’m a couple hours away now.”

“Ah. Video chat sometime tonight, then? Although I’d really love to talk in person.”

“I…” Rey does some quick calculation in her mind. “I can probably take tomorrow off and drive down to Jakku.”

“Really? Would be great if you could.”

“Yeah, shouldn’t be a problem.”

“Great! Let me know when you plan on arriving tomorrow; I’ll keep my calendar open.”

“Thanks, Bazine. I…”

“I know it’s a lot, Rey. Just try to relax. I’ll see you tomorrow?”

“...Yeah. Thanks.”

“No problem. Okay, m’bye now.” Bazine hangs up with a prim  _ click _ , and Rey is left listening to the dial tone, her mind racing.

\---

Rey arrives in Jakku after a roughly three-and-a-half-hour drive the next morning and pulls into the meager parking lot of the homeless shelter office. She’d spent an inordinate amount of time the previous evening washing her hair and choosing what to wear, as though she’d expected to meet her actual parents. As she steps out in her carefully-chosen outfit and meticulously tied-back hair, the blood pounding in her ears, she takes a quick glance around and is amazed at how little has changed, and how much anxiety this place still brings her.

“Rey?” Bazine, elegant and fully made-up and starkly out of place in the shabbiness of their surroundings, steps out of the front door in tall black heels and a slender black dress.

“Hi,” Rey says lamely, pulling her jacket a bit closer around her as she advances to meet Bazine at the entrance. 

“Lovely to see you again,” Bazine says, dark brick-red lips parting briefly in a demure smile. “Please, come right in.”

They exchange pleasantries and harmless enquiries as Bazine, swaying dangerously on her stilettos, leads them down short, quiet halls to the one conference room in the office. Once they arrive, Bazine pushes the door open with a flawlessly manicured hand and waves Rey into the room. As Rey steps in, she meets the gaze of a scruffy, hooded-eyed man in dark well-worn jeans and a faded button-up shirt, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He stands to greet her, wearing a warm smile with ease, and Rey sees the silver flecks in his dark curly hair, the lines already creasing his handsome, otherwise youthful face.

“Rey, this is Poe Dameron, from the Jakku Department of Children and Families. He’s the one who took on your case when the other adoptee reported that her birth parents didn't leave the note.”

“Nice to meet you, Rey,” Poe says with genuine warmth as he extends a broad hand, and Rey can’t help but smile back as she shakes it.

“I guess I’ll get right to it, then.” He hefts a breath as he sits back down and reaches for a folder on the table. “This,” he says as he extricates a wrinkled scrap of paper with faded writing from the folder, “is the note that we think was found with you when you showed up here.”

He hands her the paper, and Rey takes it with shaking hands. She blinks several times to clear her eyes as she tries to make out the writing.

“Please find her a good home. She’s a darling girl but we are just too poor to raise her. We love her to the sun and back. Hope one day she will understand.”

It’s signed “P. and K.”

Rey stares at the initials. “Did you…?”

“It took us some time, but we did figure out who P. and K. are,” Poe says. “We wouldn’t have been able to if it wasn’t for the collective effort to digitize and index census records, a few years ago... Anyway, we looked through marriage records in all surrounding provinces—Cantonica, Tatooine, Geonosis, so on—but couldn’t find any couple that matched. Turns out they were never married, but they did live together at one point; the residency and past employment reports just came in two days ago.”

He slides a few sheets of stapled paper to her, and she isn’t prepared to see the photo.

An unremarkable couple. The man’s hairline receding slightly, the woman’s hair tied back in a long braid. Slender, stooped shoulders, slightly sunken cheeks, guarded smiles. The woman’s smile is thin-lipped and dimpled like Rey’s, and the man's straight brows and large, guileless brown eyes mirror Rey’s. The photo has the look and quality of a semi-professional photo booth at a pharmacy, with the flat, ugly background and the posed, slightly uncomfortable attitude of the subjects.

“Their names were Petyr Solana and Kira Shand. We have records from a community health center just outside Tuanal indicating that Kira gave birth to a baby girl on your birthday. I wasn’t able to find much in the way of surviving relatives; it looks like they were on their own from an early age,” Poe says.

Rey presses helpless fingers to the faces of her parents. “Solana,” she whispers.

“They were definitely both low-income workers,” Poe continues. “Their employment history jumps around quite a bit but it seems like they stuck to contract work for the most part. Documentation is a bit spotty. Their last place of employment was at a chemical processing plant.”

“Why do you keep speaking of them in the past tense?” Rey cuts in. Bazine and Poe exchange a look of resigned discomfort.

“They died, Rey. They’ve been dead for about six years.” 

Rey knows that the wave of emotion is coming, but it hasn’t hit yet, and she struggles to stay ahead of it. She focuses on the facts.

“How?”

“It’s...inconclusive, to be honest. There was some kind of scandal with the company that owned the plant. It involved exposing employees to noxious gases and other potentially poisonous substances… There were a lot of allegations but not many facts, although from what I’ve read, it seems pretty clear that the company was turning a blind eye to a lot of substandard practices. There was a lawsuit, but it was settled outside of court.”

Rey’s heart breaks then, at the thought of her parents, destitute and alone in the world, dying anonymous, insignificant deaths.

“Did they suffer?”

“I’m not sure. Probably,” Poe says gently. “The other victims whose symptoms were documented had developed aphasia and various skin lesions when they passed.”

_ Aphasia and skin lesions?  _ Rey pictures her parents, disoriented, unable to communicate, and in pain, as they approach death, and the wave of emotions rushes upon her, and she barely manages to set the paper down on the table before the dam breaks.

\---

Flowers are so  _ fucking  _ expensive. Of course, there must be an art and a specific set of challenges associated with growing flowers, especially in the winter, but do they really need to be ten dollars a pop? Way to add to the pain of those left behind by the deceased.

These are Rey’s fleeting thoughts as she stands over the grave of her parents (technically, the people she  _ thinks _ were her parents), holding two white roses (chosen after laborious deliberation at the pricey flower shop), somewhere in the outskirts of Selah (because of course they wouldn’t be buried in any easily accessible location in any of the more populated areas of Jakku). The single elderly gravetender who opened the gate for her stands by the fence, looking on with nonjudgmental silence. Rey wonders how much he contemplates his own death. She’s strangely glad for his presence.

It occurs to her then that perhaps she should have asked Ren to accompany her, or at least informed him of the news; she hasn’t even taken the time to text him.  _ Later _ , she promises herself. For now, she wants this time, this knowledge, these feelings, to be her own.

The tombstone is small and bare, except for the names of her parents engraved in an unremarkable font.  _ Petyr Solana and Kira Shand _ . Her tears from earlier that morning have stopped, but she’s sure that they’ll soon make a reappearance. She finds herself in a strange emotional limbo, simultaneously broken-hearted and grieving for her long-suffering, long-lost parents, and numb, even apathetic, to the fate of two people she’d never known, never established any emotional connection with. There were no memories to cherish, no bonds to sever, no burdens of love to bear with a heavy heart; only a yawning abyss of regret, and a vague, polite sorrow. Rey begins to realize that the grief she feels might actually be a frustrated, inactionable guilt.

She wonders if she should say some words, but decides against it. She kneels down and places the two flowers on top of the grave, stands, wavers indecisively, turns to leave.

\---

Rey walks into a public library in Selah and asks for newspapers from about six years ago, and the librarian, grinning and chatting cheerily, leads her to the relevant shelves in the archive section and leaves her to her business. Rey stares at the girth of the year’s worth of newspapers for a moment, then steels herself, grabs an armload, and heads for the nearest free table.

Several armloads later, just as Rey is wondering if she should give up, she comes upon the first article that seems to have some relevance.

“Local Chemical Processing Plant Draws Unwanted Attention for Alleged Health Standard Violations.”

Rey fumbles in her bag for a notepad and pen.

\---

It’s late when she gets home that night. She parks in her apartment complex garage and drags herself from her car to her front door; once she gets in, she dumps food into an impatient BB8’s bowl and locks herself in her room. She wishes her emotions were discrete, tangible layers that she could just peel off and leave on her bedroom floor, but instead they are an indistinguishable tumbleweed of thorns lodged securely in her chest, and as she curls up into a ball on her bed and begins to cry afresh, the thorns only seem to stab deeper.

\---

On Thursday evening, at their usual café, Rey sits behind her usual cup of green tea and steals surreptitious stares at Ren when he isn’t looking. He hasn’t mentioned her radio silence earlier this week, and if he’s noticed her stares, he hasn’t mentioned that, either. He fidgets with his cup of too-strong coffee, clearly bothered by something. Rey waits for it to come out.

“I think,” he says presently, “that I would like to visit my mother sometime.”

Rey’s eyes snap up. “Really?”

“Yeah.”

“When were you thinking?”

“I don’t know. Maybe in a few weeks?” Ren peers anxiously into Rey’s face.

“That sounds good, Kylo.” Rey does her best to appear engaged and to smile supportively.

“What’s wrong?” He asks, seeing through it immediately. 

Rey’s face falls, and she looks away. “Nothing. Just tired.”

“Sure?”

“Yeah.”

Ren eyes her for a moment longer, then backs down.

“I’m going to be busy this weekend,” Rey says after another pause.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. I’m not going to have time for our usual breakfast or dinner.”

Ren had backed down easily a moment ago, but this time he leans forward slightly, his gaze zeroing in on her in that terrifying way. “Can I ask what you’ll be doing?”

“It’s…” Rey breaks eye contact nervously, before steeling herself and meeting his gaze again, this time with more resolve. “It’s not something I want to talk about.”

Rey watches as his eyes darken. 

“Okay,” he says after a beat, leaning away from her and taking a generous sip of his coffee, remastering himself. Rey knows how he must feel, but her mind has been made up. It’s not the right time to talk to him about everything. Not yet.

\---

Rey gets up early Saturday morning, dresses carefully, and packs her backpack. She sets up BB8’s automatic feeder before setting out for the bus stop.

Not long after that, she’s at the train station, the same one she and Ren had departed from weeks ago. She buys herself a two-way ticket to Hanna City and sits on one of the benches furthest from the entrance to wait for the train.

The train ride is uneventful (economy class this time), and she contemplates running out to the food cart to get herself a proper breakfast. The prospect of a breakfast sandwich and a yogurt parfait is tempting, but Ren’s absence makes her balk. Something about recreating this experience without him feels...wrong, as though she’s left a part of herself behind and is attempting to continue living without it. She stays rooted in her seat and watches the slowly-awakening wintry landscape speed by her.

\---

When Rey shows up at Leia’s office, she’s surprised by how cramped the premises are and how small the Senator of Chandrila’s staff seems to be. She pushes the door to the office suite open and stands in the tiny lobby area, looking uncertainly between the two cushioned chairs stuffed into the corner behind a tiny coffee table and the (what might be) receptionist talking speedily on the phone at a nearby desk.

The receptionist, a petite woman with sharp brown eyes and blonde hair tied securely into two braided buns, eventually looks up at her and stares in confusion for a moment. “Yes, sir, thank you so much for calling,” she says into the phone and hangs up promptly. Then, to Rey: “Can I help you?”

Rey glances behind the receptionist down the short, wide hallway, at what she thinks is the Senator’s office.

“I’d… I’d like to see the Senator, please.”

“Do you have an appointment?” The receptionist glances at her computer screen.

“No, but I…”

“I’m sorry, it looks like she’s got another phone call in five minutes. I can pencil you in for...tomorrow at 1:45 in the afternoon, if that would be all right?”

“I…” Rey is berating herself for not thinking ahead and struggling to come up with something to say that might convince the receptionist to let her through, when Leia’s door opens and she steps out, smoothing down an already-wrinkleless grey pantsuit and muttering something under her breath.

“Kaydel, could you—” She starts to say, then stops when she sees Rey. Rey sees recognition flash in Leia’s eyes, followed by something less identifiable.

Kaydel rises from her desk. “I’m sorry, Senator, I tried to explain—”

“It’s all right, Kaydel.” Leia approaches, giving Rey a cautious once-over. “I don’t believe we’ve been formally introduced,” she says as she stops within a few feet of Rey.

“I’m Rey—Solana.” Rey hasn’t had the opportunity to test the feeling of her real full name in her mouth, to master the non-instinctive syllables, but the moment passes quickly as Leia steps forward to take Rey’s proffered hand.

“Does this have to do with Ben?” Leia asks.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Just ‘Leia’ is fine. Kaydel, what other appointments do I have today?”

Kaydel squints slightly at her computer screen. “You have a phone call in two minutes with some representatives from the gun control activist group, a press conference for your low-income healthcare reform proposal in the afternoon. Some paperwork that you’ll need to find time for sometime today... No lunch engagements.”

“Would you like to meet me for lunch, then, Rey?”

Rey blinks. “Oh, uh, sure.”

“How about the same restaurant where we first met?” Leia then asks Kaydel to inquire if there are still seats available, to make a reservation at noon if so, to give Rey the address, and what did she come out here to do again? Oh, to call Senator Amedda’s aide with a brief message, before giving Rey a brief, guarded smile and returning to her office.

Kaydel dutifully calls and makes a reservation, then shoots Rey a polite but dismissive smile as she hands Rey a slip of paper with the address of the restaurant written on it. Rey takes it and scurries out of the office.

\---

Rey ducks into a nearby coffee shop to kill the remaining time before noon, knowing all too well that she will be too stressed and distracted and wrapped up in her own mind to wander around and see more of Hanna City. She makes the mistake of checking her phone, and sees a single text from Ren, from much earlier in the morning.

“How are you doing?”

_ Oh, you know. About to have lunch with your mother _ .

Rey exhales and pockets her phone. She knows she’ll have to tell him at some point. It’s difficult for her, though, to share pain. It’s difficult to be confrontational and intimate when her natural instinct is to make herself scarce, to hide until the storm is over. But she knows that there is no hiding from Ren; she will inevitably find herself back in his orbit, in the eye of the hurricane that is his presence, and she knows that the confrontation will be inevitable.

\---

When they sit down together at a table in the restaurant, Leia wastes no time in pointing out Ben’s favorite items on the menu and reminiscing about the items that are no longer offered. When they’ve placed their orders, Leia folds her hands primly on the table and fixes Rey with a stare that is part loving mother, part shrewd politician, and wholly, unexpectedly terrifying.

“So,” Leia says slowly. “You’re here to talk about my son?”

“Yes.”

“What is it you want to know? Did something happen?”

“In a way, yes.” Rey sighs, realizing that she’s going to have to go back to the beginning. She tells Leia, as briefly as possible, about her childhood, and her ever-lingering desire to find her birth parents, even though they seemed by all appearances to want nothing to do with her. She tells Leia about the phone call from Bazine, the details that were revealed during her visit to Jakku. She tells Leia about visiting a public library to uncover what she could about the chemical processing plant.

At no point does Leia interrupt her and demand that she get to the point. She watches and listens intently, her warm brown eyes trained almost unblinkingly on Rey the entire time, even after their food arrives.

“Sen—Leia, the plant that my parents worked at was owned by Yavin Provision, Inc.”

Leia does not move for a long time. Finally, she nods slowly, her expression unreadable.

“I found an article from the time of the lawsuit that mentioned Yavin Provision’s Chief Compliance Officer.”

“Yes.”

“Their Chief Compliance Officer was someone named Benjamin Solo.”

Leia’s gaze remains steady still. “Yes,” she repeats.

“Was he…?” Rey had prepared a list of incisive, cool-headed, fact-driven questions for Leia, for this precise moment. She has them written down on a sheet of paper in her bag. She makes no move to reach for them now.

“Were they true? All of the allegations?”

“This isn’t something you’ve discussed with Ben,” Leia observes.

Rey shakes her head no.

“Why didn’t you talk to him about it first?”

_ Is Leia deflecting? _ Rey’s stomach sinks at the implications of a politician deflecting a question, but she puts that aside for now.

“To be honest,” she says, biting her lip, “I wasn’t sure how he would react. I wasn’t sure how revealing what I knew would affect our relationship. And I… I’m…”

“You’re not ready for what you have with Ben to end,” Leia says, and her smile is soft and kind. Rey stares at her, stricken, unable to deny her words.

Leia hefts a sigh. “I wish I could change the past, Rey,” she begins, and Rey knows that that isn’t the beginning of a good answer. “I wish I could undo what happened to your parents. But yes, I’m afraid that the evidence seems to indicate that your parents, along with some of their co-workers, were poisoned through exposure to harmful substances.

“And yes, you are correct about Ben being the CCO of Yavin Provisions at the time. He started out as a floor manager, you know,” Leia says with a touch of warmth. “He worked his way up internally, all the way to CCO. Han and I were so proud. But as Ben got closer to the top, we started to see and hear things about the company leadership that led to questions, and…”

Leia, for the first time that day, looks away. 

“There was a lot going on in our lives then, Rey. Han and I weren’t doing well together, and my career was demanding more and more of me, and of our family. Snoke—the CEO of Yavin then, as I’m sure you know—became one of my biggest campaign donors, and I couldn’t afford to lose his support. There was so much that I stood to lose. And I thought that whatever was going on at Yavin, Ben would be able to take care of it. He wouldn’t allow anything horrible to happen.  _ Snoke _ wouldn’t allow anything horrible to happen. But the details started to get blurrier and blurrier, and Snoke became less and less forthcoming with his plans and his clients and where most of his supposed research and development grant money was coming from and...we knew it was getting out of hand, but we couldn’t even comprehend...the  _ magnitude  _ of it…”

Leia stares down at her food, clearly not intending to eat any of it.

“We went on a vacation once. Ben’s probably told you about this. We went on a cruise... It was a last ditch attempt by the three of us to smooth things over and give ourselves a fresh start with each other. But Yavin came up, as it always did those days. By that time, Han was convinced that Yavin was pure evil, and he also accused Ben of things that he shouldn’t have. And Ben… Well,” Leia sighs. “To this day, Ben still blames himself for what happened.”

“Yes, he told me about that,” Rey mutters. “He mentioned that the argument had been about his work. But he hadn’t said…” She trails off, wondering if Ren had planned on ever telling her about Yavin.

“I’m sorry, Rey,” Leia finally says, and the subdued shame in her voice is almost unbearable to Rey. “I’m sorry that I didn’t do more to get Ben out of Yavin. I’m sorry that I wasn’t aggressive enough to push for answers earlier on. I’m sorry that my lack of action led to you losing your parents, and to other people losing their loved ones. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to bring Snoke and his people to justice in court. And I’m sorry that I wasn’t willing to stand by my values when I needed to most.”

“I didn’t come here to assign blame or hear apologies,” Rey says, quickly but resolutely. “As much as I longed after my parents, I don’t think I can say that I had any claim of love to them, or that I can accept apologies on their behalf. And I’m sure there’s more than enough blame to go around for everyone involved. I just… I just want to know what happened.”

“There is a lot that I still don’t know,” Leia says, “and I’m sure there are also gaps in Ben’s knowledge. There was a formal investigation, yes, but the lawsuit was ultimately unsuccessful, and we have to assume that Snoke did everything in his power to cover up the extent of his crimes. Once he realized that Ben was intending to cooperate with the prosecution, he berated Ben in front of Yavin’s board and fired him on the spot.”

Leia picks up her fork and stabs at her lunch, moving the food around restlessly.

“There were already things that seemed suspect,” she continues, “but nothing that seemed  _ harmful  _ to anyone. Han thought that it meant bigger trouble, though, and he tried to warn Ben off. But Han was essentially claiming that Snoke was going behind his own CCO’s back on these decisions, and Ben refused to believe that that was possible. He didn’t think Snoke could be so bold, or cunning, or that Snoke would insult him in that way, or that he himself was so incompetent.”

“I hate to say it,” Rey says slowly, “but it doesn’t sound like a disagreement that would…”

“Escalate to a physical fight?” Leia snorts. “Our family was on the brink of disintegration, Rey. Han and I were young when we got married, and we had Ben before we were ready to take on the responsibility of raising a child. When Ben came into our lives, it was at the worst possible time. Han’s business was taking off, my ambitions to become a Senator were finally seeming like an actual possibility… and I’m afraid Ben got left behind in all the excitement. I neglected my duty as a mother, and Han his as a father. Luke was more of a parent to Ben than either of us.

“That cruise,” Leia says over a hefty sigh, “that cruise was my paltry, too-little-too-late attempt at sparking the parent-child dynamic that Ben had been starved of since childhood. He was already resenting the fact that I thought that a cruise could even begin to fix what was broken between us. He was already resenting Han and me for our absence in his life, for all the promises we made to him that we broke. He was already bent on proving that he could live a happy, fulfilled, successful life without us. So when Han accused him of not knowing what was going on under his own nose, Ben snapped.”

Leia sounds curiously hollow as she recounts her story. Her brazen self-castigation seems in stark, uncomfortable contrast with her passionless tone, her methodical story-telling. Rey wonders how many times she told herself this, how many tears she shed, before the searing pain faded to a numb acceptance of reality.

“But Han was right in the end,” Rey says softly.

“Yes,” Leia says, a touch of humor in her eyes. “That’s the thing about my husband. He was always right when we needed him to be. After Han’s death, Ben began to do some digging, especially after workers began calling in sick with consistent symptoms, and  _ especially _ after they began to pass away.”

“And when the lawsuit was filed, Ben agreed to cooperate with the prosecution?”

“Secretly at first, but Snoke found out. We’re still not sure how. We both did everything we could, and we got many of his co-workers to amass data and records as well. Unfortunately Snoke took countermeasures, and our efforts were too little, too late.” Leia makes a disgusted sound. “It seems like that is a recurring theme in my life.”

“It’s not too late. With Ben,” Rey says, immediately feeling lame after uttering the words.

“Perhaps. It’s more difficult to hold onto that hope with every day,” Leia replies, smiling sadly.

“He misses you. He’s been talking about calling you over the past few weeks, but he hasn’t worked up the nerve to do anything about it yet.”

“Well, our family has an established history of leaving important things off for far too long,” Leia sighs. “Anyway, I won’t push him to do anything he doesn’t want to do. But I do miss him dearly.”

“I’ll keep chipping away at him,” Rey says.

“How is he doing these days?” Leia asks, and her face lights up slightly as she searches Rey’s face.

“If you mean in terms of physical health, I guess he’s...fine?” Rey says awkwardly. “I, uh, we work at the same company. He was promoted to President about three months ago.”

“Was he?” Leia looks pleased. “He always was a hard worker, my Ben.” And just like that, her face is falling again. Rey watches, helpless, as Leia descends into a sea of memories and deep-seated emotions, her eyes distant.

“I’m sorry, Leia,” Rey says after a long silence.

“I’m sorry, too,” Leia replies. They share a rueful smile over the powerlessness of these words.

\---

When Rey drags herself out of the train, ready to sleep off the day’s emotions and wake up with a hopefully marginally clearer mind, she thinks that she’s finally gone off the deep end when she spies Ren’s hulking figure standing on the platform, frowning down at his watch. His gaze snaps up as she steps out of the train, and their eyes meet as the train’s doors slide shut.

\---

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did it hurt? :P
> 
> Also, what do we do during a pandemic? The correct answer, of course, is to read/write more fan fiction! wheee
> 
> On a more serious note -- everyone, please stay safe during this pandemic! Spread generosity, care, and love; not panic and hate/blame!


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Final chapter!

“Where were you on Tuesday?” He says, finally. He’d crossed the platform in two wide strides and offered to take her bag wordlessly, his expression guarded. They’d walked to his car from the train station; she’d struggled to keep up in her clunky snow boots. They’d gotten into his car and waited a few excruciatingly silent minutes as his car warmed up. And now, finally, halfway home, he speaks.

“Jakku,” she mutters nervously.

“Oh.” He frowns, glances at her. “Did something happen?”

“Yeah.”

They sit in a tense silence, both waiting for the other to speak. Rey steals a look at Ren; his brow is furrowed, and he looks concerned, slightly hurt. She looks away quickly.

“How was today?” He asks eventually.

“It was all right,” Rey replies. “How did you know…?”

“That you went to Hanna City?” Ren shrugs. “I had a hunch.”

“Oh.” Rey frowns.

“How was my mother?” He tries after a brief pause.

“She seems fine.”

“Rey,” he sighs, “look, I know we have a… a connection that neither of us can explain. But I can’t see through you. I don’t always know what’s going on in your head… Could you tell me what this was about? Did I do something wrong?” His voice takes on a tone of pleading, and Rey finds it difficult to bear. She had expected anger, indignation—his usual modes of defense. She had not expected cajoling.

“I don’t know where to begin,” she mutters.

“Start anywhere.”

\---

By the time she’s done, they’re sitting in Ren’s idling car on the street outside her apartment. The heat is blasting, and it’s still barely enough to ward off the cold of the night. Ren is leaning against the door of the driver’s seat, his face turned away, his shoulders stooped. Rey is leaning against the door of the passenger’s seat in the opposite direction, gripping her seatbelt with both hands, her forehead pressed against the cold of the window. The silence in the car is oppressive.

“I had to find out for myself,” Rey murmurs. “I had to learn about my parents and their deaths, and I had to investigate for myself how they died. I didn’t want to confront you with any of this, or to listen to your version before I did some digging on my own.”

“Why?” Ren rasps. “You don’t trust me?”

Rey bites her lip.

“Rey…”—and his voice is so broken that Rey feels a sting of remorse—“I wouldn’t have lied to you about any of this.”

“When were you planning on telling me about it?”

“I… I don’t know. It didn’t seem to have any relevance to us, and it’s something that is still painful for me to talk about, and… I didn’t want to lose you.” Ren covers his face with his hands. “When you learned about my family history on that goddamned trip, I thought for sure that you would leave me, and you would have been entirely in your right to do so. When you made it clear that you weren’t going anywhere, I felt so lucky and so... _ terrified _ . I thought our relationship couldn’t handle another ugly reveal, at least not this soon.”

Ren leans across the gap to touch her arm, and she flinches away. He clenches the hand into a fist and lowers it back into his lap.

“Kylo, I…need some time to myself,” Rey says, her voice barely above a whisper.

Ren swallows. “I understand.”

“I believe that you did everything you could at Yavin, but it feels...wrong, almost, to be this close to you, knowing that you were involved in...in…”

“I understand.” Again, mechanically.

“Good. Okay.”

Long silence.

“Rey, I…”  _ I’m sorry. I love you. _

“Don’t say it.”  _ I love you. I’m sorry _ .

She reaches into the backseat to retrieve her bag and flees from the car.

\---

“Hello?”

“...”

“ _ Hello? _ ”

“Hey, mom.” His voice comes out shaky and high, and he wants to kick himself.

“...Ben?”

“Yeah, it’s me.”

“I… Honey, I…” Then, more distantly, “Kaydel, can you reschedule my 3 o’clock?”

“Oh, no, mom, if you’re busy then—”

“No, no, Ben. It’s okay. I… Jesus, I can’t remember the last time you called.”

“I can’t either,” Ben says honestly.

“I take it Rey talked to you?”

“...Yeah.”

“Oh, Ben.” Leia sighs over the phone, and it really strikes him then—just how  _ old  _ the two of them are now.

“She said that she wants some space,” Ben says glumly. “Does that ever mean anything good?”

“I know things look grim now, but she doesn’t seem like someone who would ask for space as a way of ghosting you.”

“No, she doesn’t. But I wouldn’t blame her if she did.”

“She didn’t seem to blame you for anything that happened, any more than I do.”

“I honestly can’t tell,” Ben says morosely.

“I know it is right now. But she’ll eventually let you know how she feels, and we can only wait and give her space until then.”

“What do I do with myself in the meantime?”

“How about not spending the entirety of your first phone call with your mother since however long ago talking about your girlfriend troubles?”

“She’s  _ not  _ my girlfriend, mom.” Pause. “Not really.”

“What is she to you, then?”

“Did you ever feel a need to label what you had with Dad?”

“We got married, didn’t we?”

“Yes, but…” Ben sighs in exasperation. “Before that. When you two were just...together.”

“He was a difficult one to pin down, that’s true,” Leia says ruefully. “But I always made sure that I understood where exactly we were with each other, even if our relationship wasn’t...conventional. That’s how you avoid hurting people or being hurt, Ben.”

Ben thinks for a bit.

“Have you told Rey how you feel?” Leia continues cautiously.

“What do you mean?”

“Wasn’t born yesterday,” Leia quips. “I know it takes a lot for you to let someone in. Rey isn’t just a friend to you, is she?”

“...No. I guess not. We have this...connection. Sometimes I think she knows me better than I know myself. It’s hard to explain.”

“Have you thought about telling her?”

“Well, yes, but now is hardly the time.”

“No, I suppose not.”

There is a silence between them, more companionable than awkward, and Ben sits back at his desk, his tie loosened and thrown over his shoulder to keep it from flopping onto his keyboard, his hair rumpled from the nervous attentions of his hand. He smiles as he looks out the window.

“I miss you, mom.”

“I miss you too, Ben. I’m glad that you seem to be doing so well. Job at Kenobi’s, a potential girlfriend…”

“Mom,” Ben groans.

“Sorry, not sorry,” Leia says smugly, quoting something that Ben has only heard the younger employees at his company say jokingly to each other. He groans again.

“Anyway,” Leia pushes on, “come visit me sometime. We have so much to catch up on. And there are so many new restaurants and cafés in Hanna City that you need to try!”

“Sure, I’d like that.”

“And you still need to visit your father’s grave. A  _ proper _ visit. I know he would love that.”

Ben’s throat swells up, and he struggles to tamp down on the instinct to refuse. “O-Okay,” he manages to choke out.

“Okay?”

“Yeah. Okay.”

“Okay. Bye for now. I love you, Ben.”

“...Love you too, mom.”

\---

The days begin to bleed into weeks, and Ben begins to lose hope of hearing from Rey. He finds solace in reconnecting with his mother, in withdrawing from his overwhelming list of work responsibilities and his achingly Rey-less apartment on weeknights and weekends to travel out to Hanna City to sit with Leia in various hole-in-the-wall restaurants and coffee shops during her slivers of free time. The first few meetings are awkward, tense, and sometimes painful, but through an unspoken, mutual commitment, they keep trying, keep seeing each other, keep learning new things and relearning old things about each other. And eventually, the awkwardness and tenseness and painfulness are eclipsed by a tenuous intimacy.

Leia mercifully holds off on asking about Rey until they are several weeks into their attempt at reunion. Ben has to consciously refrain from lashing out when Leia peers up at him and pipes a casual “So, how’s Rey?”

_ Rey _ . The mention of her name, a glimpse of her face in the breakroom window or from across the room at staff meetings—even the slightest flicker of her presence in his thoughts, and he’s lost to the anxiety and anger and longing that he’s tried so hard to cauterize. Leia’s face falls, mirroring Ben’s change in expression.

“I see,” she says, folding her hands in her lap.

“It still hurts to think about her,” Ben mutters. “I miss her so much, mom… But there isn’t anything I can do.”

“You haven’t heard anything from her? Not a word?”

“Nothing.”

“Well, that’s just ridiculous,” Leia exclaims. “Needing space is one thing, but total noncommunication for weeks…”

“I can’t just knock down her door and demand that she talk to me, can I?” Ben snaps. “She requested space, and I’m going to give that to her for as long as she needs.”

“She may have said that she just needs ‘some time,’ but letting this drag on will be detrimental to both of you. She can’t leave you hanging and put off making a decision forever.”

The look that Leia gives Ben is one that he remembers all too well—a strange, infuriating mix of expectation and resigned disappointment. He looks away, the cord in his jaw flexing as he grits his teeth.

“What if I don’t want to hear her answer?” He mutters.

“You must already know what it will be, then.”

“I…” Ben’s gaze seeks out anything other than his mother’s warm brown eyes. “I hope it will be one thing, but I’m afraid it will be the other thing.”

“Then you have nothing to lose. Don’t you see? If her answer is what you hope it will be, then you can take joy in that, and move forward. If her answer is what you are afraid of, then better to get it over with and move on than to continue living in this—this limbo.”

“There is no moving on from her, mom,” Ben says. “I, I…”

Leia watches her son’s mouth work soundlessly, waiting for him to say it, even daring him to.

“I love her,” he finally says, brokenly, and she lets out a breath.

“Are you certain, Ben? Being in love with someone and being used to someone’s presence in your life are two different things.”

“I never did believe in soulmates, but it feels like...like we share the same soul.” Ben searches for the words. “Like we are one, in some way. We know each other so well at this point, every tic, every flaw, and I love her—everything about her. And the thought of her being with someone else, or  _ me _ being with someone else, is just…” He trails off at the intensity of the feeling.

“Is it something that you think would fade over time?”

Ben thinks about the otherworldly dreams that have plagued him since first seeing Rey. He thinks of the dimples that crease her cheeks when she smiles, the haunted gaze of a survivor that peeks through in her eyes sometimes, the grace with which she bears her broken childhood and her solitude, her unflinching support when he told her about his fractured family, her compassion for Rose and Temmin, and now—

“No,” Ben whispers.

“Then,” Leia says gently, “is it not worth fighting for? Or following up on, at least, for goodness’ sake.”

\---

Rey wakes up on a Saturday, weeks after Ren picked her up from the train station, and rolls over slowly in her bed to disentangle herself from the sheets, and smiles at the sight of early-morning sunlight streaming into her room between the slats of her blinds, and then remembers that it will be yet another Saturday without Ren.

She pushes herself slowly to her feet, pausing to brush her fingers over the framed picture of her parents that she now keeps on her bedside table.  _ Petyr Solana and Kira Shand _ . She’s gone through the cumbersome legal proceedings for changing her last name, and her utility bills and credit card statements and National Geographic subscription are now addressed to Rey Solana, and the sight of it on paper is still foreign and evocative for her.

Ren’s dark eyes and warm, tenacious presence invade her mind again, staking his claim on her thoughts and feelings, and she turns away, annoyed and tired and heartsore.

She pads out of her room and into the kitchen, and BB8 weaves between her legs and meows enthusiastically as she dumps wet food in his bowl.

“Lucky cat,” she mumbles as she watches BB8 eat, before turning away to make her own breakfast.

Halfway through her meal of haphazardly scrambled eggs and reheated frozen waffles, her phone buzzes in her bedroom. Plate of food in tow, she scrambles for her bedroom and roots around in the blankets for the buzzing thing.

‘Kylo Ren (Ben?)’.

_ Why is he calling? I need more time. I can’t face him. I can’t hear his voice. I still have to change the contact name to Benjamin Solo. Should I pick up? _

Her fragmented, panicked thoughts spin uncontrollably in her mind like snowflakes in a strong gust of wind. BB8 meows from the kitchen.

She accepts the call and holds the phone to her ear.

“Hello?” And, oh god, it’s  _ his _ voice on the other end, and it’s a sound that she’s missed with all her heart, and it’s a sound that she’s hoped she would never have to hear again.

She opens her mouth, but her voice fails her.

BB8 pads innocently into her room and meows again. Loudly.

“I can hear BB8,” Ben says flatly.

Rey’s nerves are like live wires; she laughs too loudly. 

“Sorry. I… BB8 came in and I…” She trails off, and Ben waits patiently on the other end.

“Ben,” she says, remastering herself with great difficulty, “why are you calling?”

“I think it’s time for us to talk.”

“Don’t you think that’s something we should both have a say in?”

“If I leave you alone for the rest of your life, would you ever talk to me again?”

Rey turns and walks aggressively back into the kitchen, eggs and waffles forgotten. “If I never want to talk to you again, would you have a problem with that?”

Ben is silent for a moment.

“Do you mean that, Rey?” He says quietly. “Do you never want to talk to me again?”

Rey holds her breath.

“If that’s what you want,” Ben continues, “I’ll respect that. I know that I was involved in the death of your parents, Rey, and I’m sorry. I would do anything to undo it, but I can’t.” His voice is bitter. “I can’t… I have no right to ask for your forgiveness. So if you never want to talk to me again, if you want to—to put our—our relationship away, then I won’t fight that.”

Rey closes her eyes and pictures the face she knows so well now, the Adam’s apple bobbing, the jaw working silently with unspoken emotion.

“Should we talk about this in person?” She says gently.

“...I’d like that.”

“When are you available?”

“Today? Right now?”

“Now?” Rey parrots, her heart hammering in her chest.

“It doesn’t have to be now. I just… I know you wanted space, but it’s been  _ weeks _ , Rey. Weeks of not knowing where we stand, weeks of not knowing how you’re doing…”

Rey feels simultaneously rankled and guilty. She knows, deep down, that if he never reached out to her, she would have been content to let their connection die slowly and on uncertain terms, and that would have been unfair to him and, in the end, no less painful for them both. She glances into her room at BB8, and realizes that the little scavenger has hopped onto her bed and is helping himself to her breakfast. She whisper-shouts “BB8!” and hurries to rescue the remnants of her breakfast.

“I suppose I’m free now,” she says in a normal voice as she whisks the plate away and escapes to the kitchen to throw out the remnants of the food. “I just...need to eat breakfast first.”

“Do you want to get breakfast together?”

“It’s all right, I’ll just eat something quick.”

“All right.” Ben thinks for a moment. “Would you be all right with meeting at my place or your place? Or would you prefer somewhere out in public?”

“Oh. I, uh, don’t have any preference.”

“I can be over at your place in about half an hour?”

“That should be fine.”

“All right. See you then, Rey.”

They hang up, Rey’s pulse thundering in her ears.

\---

She is woefully unready for the moment their eyes meet.

True, she’s seen him fleetingly around the office; true, she’s glimpsed his car pulling into the parking lot in the mornings, or leaving the parking lot in the evenings. But she hasn’t been this close to him for weeks now, and certainly not close enough to feel the intensity of his gaze on her, to feel diminutive next to his towering height and his broad shoulders and chest…

She looks away from him almost as soon as they meet eyes, and he steps into her apartment slowly, filling up her tiny entryway area as he’d always done before, his mop of black hair tousled by the morning air, his long dark coat replaced by a shorter jacket now that winter is beginning to show signs of fading into spring. As he removes his shoes, BB8 saunters up to him, gives him a perfunctory sniff, and begins rubbing against Ben’s legs with perfect nonchalance.

Ben leans down and picks up the orange-and-white cat with those hands (were his hands always  _ that _ huge?) and stands in the doorway, scratching BB8’s chin in just the right way and looking down at Rey with uncertainty. She stares at BB8 curled up against Ben’s chest for a moment, then leads the way into the living room.

“Have you eaten yet? I can whip something up for you,” Rey says banally. 

Ben glances at her as he settles down into one of her loveseats. “I’ve already eaten, thanks.”

“Anything to drink then?”

“There’s no need to trouble yourself,” he says, becoming slightly flustered. 

“I was going to make some tea for myself. No trouble.”

“Oh, well, if you were already going to make some, then...”

Probably the most boring exchange between them to date. Rey turns on her heel and hides in the kitchen to make tea.

When she returns, holding two mugs and treading carefully, she finds BB8 still curled up on Ben’s chest, his eyes half-closed and his paws kneading as he lies wedged into the crook of Ben’s arm. Rey sets Ben’s cup of tea on the tiny coffee table in front of him, and he stares at her wordlessly as she settles into another seat at a safe distance from him.

“I’ve missed you,” he says, simply. She stares at him over her mug of tea, taking a long sip to buy herself time.

“I’ve missed you too,” she replies, because it’s true. She  _ has _ missed him, bitterly on some days. 

“How have you been?” He inquires, his voice soft. Damn his soft voice and soft, intense, dark eyes and his lips. And those  _ hands _ .

Rey tries to swallow discreetly. “I-I’ve been fine. How have you been?”

“Not fine,” he says. “Not since the day I picked you up at the train station.”

“I’m sorry,” she says, looking away. “I know it wasn’t fair of me to keep you hanging for so long.”

“I’m sorry too,” Ben murmurs, his voice gravelly and raw. “For my part in your parents’ death. For...for everything.”

“I know you are. I forgive you.”

“Do you?”

Rey nods slowly. It’s something she’s come to decide over the past few weeks; as much as the premature, wrongful death of her parents grieves her, and as much as she wants to wreak justice on everyone involved in their deaths, she finds that she cannot hold any of it against Ben. After poring over all the news articles and reports that she could find regarding the Yavin scandal, learning about what happened from Leia, and seeing the anguish on his face when she revealed what she’d discovered, it had become clear to her that Ben had not been willingly complicit with Snoke’s plans. He had blown the whistle in the end, and it had been too little, too late… But what happened was past, and his desire to do penance was sufficient for her to forgive him. Whether her parents would approve of her decision was another question entirely, but she hoped that they would at least understand.

Ben peers into her face with disbelief, leaning forward, nearly pitching BB8 from his chest. The small cat yowls and paws at him in annoyance, and he settles back to placate the cat, his eyes never leaving Rey.

“I’m glad,” he finally says, and a crease lines his cheek as a tentative smile breaks out across his face.

“I am too. But,” she says quickly, and he freezes, the smile falling a bit, “I do not intend to let the past die. The class-action lawsuit against Snoke didn’t succeed; I intend on seeing what I can do to revive the case.”

Ben blanches. “Rey, at this point he’s practically untouchable. I’m not sure there is anything that can be done to bring him to justice.”

“I will have to see about that for myself, then,” Rey replies calmly, fixing Ben with a stare that he knows to back down from.

“Well, if that’s what you want to do, then I will support you however I can,” Ben vows, and Rey detects a little of his usual intense darkness in his promise.

Ben looks down at BB8 in his arms for a moment, apparently formulating a thought in his head. BB8 blinks up at him slowly, with unreadable, unempathetic feline eyes.

“Can I ask why you took so long?” Ben asks after a moment.

Rey leans back and sips at her tea, thinking for a moment.

“Honestly,” she says slowly, “I thought I had driven you away.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I did all of these things without telling you… It felt wrong to find out about my parents and not tell you, and even more wrong to research the Yavin scandal and talk to your mother about it without telling you. I wanted to find out more about what happened, but I also wanted to avoid confronting you, making you angry, scaring you off with my questions… And it was selfish of me to want both.”

“It wasn’t,” Ben says vehemently. “Selfish of you, I mean. I don’t judge you for wanting to find out the truth, or for not wanting to talk to me about it.” 

He turns away. “I should have been open with you about it earlier on,” he mutters. “I certainly didn’t want you to find out about it in such a traumatic way. And… I don’t know if I will ever be able to say this enough, but I’m sorry, Rey. I’m sorry for my part in taking your parents away before you could meet them… I feel as though I’ve robbed you of something irreplaceable. I don’t know why you would ever want to talk to me again.” He hangs his head.

“Oh, Ben,” Rey says warmly, putting her tea down and reaching for him. “There are many things that I would give up to have a chance to meet my parents. But you aren’t one of them.”

“No?” He mutters as she tugs a protesting BB8 from his arms and slides into BB8’s place.

“No,” she says firmly, snuggling her cheek against Ben’s collarbone. “It hurt to know that I was abandoned, and it hurts now to know that I will never get to meet my parents. But I know now that they gave me up out of love, so that I would have a chance at living a better life than them. I also know that you weren’t a part of Snoke’s schemes willingly or knowingly, and that you did everything you could to stop him once you knew...and that’s all anyone could ask of you now. We all need second chances, Ben; we all need the people around us to believe in us. So I can’t think of a better way of honoring my parents and their sacrifice than granting you that.”

Rey utters these words with slow deliberation. Ben hangs onto every one of them. She’s hardly finished when he’s hunching forward and wrapping her in his arms and cupping the back of her neck with his hand, his fingers snaking quickly through her hair, and she shudders at the familiar, heady sensation, only realizing now how much she’s missed it.

“Rey, I…” His chest beneath her cheek rises and falls unevenly. She wraps her arms around him and rubs his back soothingly; he only tightens his arms around her. She feels a familiar tug on her hair and tilts her head back to look up at him.

“I love you,” he murmurs, his eyes dark and shining. His voice is almost unrecognizable; it sounds as though he’s just been dragged out of water.

“I love you too,” Rey says quietly.

His warm hand presses lightly but insistently at the back of her head. She finally relents, folding herself into him, and he seals her mouth with a kiss.

\---

“How are you doing?” Rey says as she sits down across from Rose, slowly. They haven’t spoken since Rey left the Chandrila hospital, and have only caught glimpses of each other since Rose returned from bereavement leave. Now, Rey, having walked into the cafeteria at a time that isn’t her usual lunchtime, and having seen Rose tucked away in a corner and staring down at her lunch with unmistakable dejection, feels compelled to approach her.

Rose looks up at her, uncomprehending at first, cautious, unwelcoming. She seems to recognize Rey gradually.

“Rey,” she says, her smile uneven and rusty.

“Hey,” Rey says gently. She doesn’t normally think of herself as the touchy-feely comforting type, but she instinctively reaches her hand out and grasps Rose’s limp fingers.

“I…” Rose begins, looking away, trying to gather her thoughts. “I’m doing as well as I think I could be,” she finally says. “It still hurts, though. After all these weeks. But I guess it always will.”

“I’m sorry,” Rey says, feeling frustratingly helpless in the face of Rose’s grief. “Let me know if you need anything. I know we aren’t terribly close or anything, and I never knew your sister, but if there’s anything I can do…”

Rose smiles softly. “I will. Thank you, Rey.” Then, to Rey’s consternation, Rose’s smile turns from soft to sly.

“So. You and Kylo, huh?”

Rey ducks her head and groans.

“I don’t mean to pry,” Rose says, laughing, “but it’s certainly not something I saw coming at all. When I finally realized that it was you and Kylo in the hospital with me, I thought I was hallucinating from the painkillers.” Rose seems eager to change the topic, so Rey reluctantly allows the focus to switch to herself.

“Yeah, we’re, uh…” Rey fumbles for the correct term. “...dating?” 

It’s not an accurate word for her relationship with Ben, not even close. It sounds too casual for the connection they’ve formed, too shallow for the intimacy that they now share, too flippant for the sheer electric connection and still-inexplicable sense of familiarity and the strange dreams that have plagued them since they first met. The term “boyfriend” certainly doesn’t begin to encompass what Ben means to her. It seems to satisfy Rose, though, who squeals excitedly before trying to recall their company’s dating policies.

“Kenobi’s so chill, though, I’m sure he wouldn’t mind… And it’s not like you work  _ directly  _ for Kylo, so maybe it’s okay? But like, can we go back to the fact that you two are  _ not _ something I saw coming? Like at all?? But I kinda dig it! Kylo’s the tall, dark, broody type, and you’re the smaller, pretty one who’s a literal ray of sunshine, and… Yeah, I’m totally feeling this dynamic!” Rose does an excited wiggle, and her watery gaze is now bright.

“Oh… Ahaha… I, uh…” Rey realizes now that she hasn’t talked about Ben and herself as a couple with anyone before, and it’s at once elating and terrifying.

Rose seems to sense it, and turns her excitement down a few notches. “Sorry,” she says sheepishly. “It’s just, I love a good office romance. I’m totally rooting for you guys!”

“Thanks,” Rey squeaks.

“Thank  _ you _ for coming over and talking to me,” Rose replies. “I really appreciate it.”

“I’m glad. And like I said, if you ever need anything… Or if you ever want to, um, hang out...?”

Rose grins. “I’d love to sometime.”

\---

Autumn is in full swing; the trees are clothed in leaves of vibrant yellow-golds and scarlets and deep russet browns, and the air, humid and heavy throughout the tail end of summer, is now clear and heady and crisp.

Rey had tried her hand at making a casserole, and damned if it hadn’t turned out halfway decent. It sits now on Leia’s dining table, next to Ben’s fancy turkey stuffing, nestled in the midst of the many other side dishes that other guests of Leia’s Thanksgiving dinner have contributed.

Across the room, Rose flits from guest to guest like the radiant, adorable little bird that she is, talking animatedly with everyone she meets. Trailing behind her, cradling BB8, the polar opposite of Rose in every way, is Armitage (or Armie, as Rose affectionately insists on calling him), the red-haired waiter from the Italian restaurant that Rey and Ben had eaten at all those months ago. Rose has been seeing him for a few weeks now, and he’s clearly outside of his comfort zone at this party, alternating between stealing longing gazes at Rose and avoiding conversation with other people by crooning to BB8.

In their secluded corner of the living room, Ben and Rey sit flush against each other on the couch, and they content themselves with watching the festive scene unfold before them. At some point, Leia plies them with a variety of holiday drinks (all of which are alcoholic, because some things about Leia never change), and Luke stops by to say hello with Chewie, but otherwise they are left well alone.

The months have been good to them; the bond between them has bloomed from something that was as intense and passionate as it was tenuous into something that is well-worn, sturdy, and rooted deeply in an intimate, unglamorous, day-to-day love. On some days, Rey finds herself missing the novel, volatile intensity of their earlier days; on other days, she looks back on everything she’s been through with Ben, and she wouldn’t trade where they are now for anything.

There is still no explanation for the dreams that Rey and Ben experienced when they first met, and which they still experience today. Sometimes the dreams are inane, vague, even soothing; impressions of emotions, shafts of quivering light, an almost-tangible presence of peace and contentment (or at least stillness). Other times the dreams are violent and disturbing, brimming with stiff bodies and lifeless eyes and a cold, oppressive hopelessness, and they wake with sweat on their brows and a lingering sensation of something dark, evil even. 

Rey still wonders if these dreams are really just dreams. She wonders if she should start believing in past lives and reincarnation, even though the very suggestion of it makes her want to roll her eyes.

But none of it matters in the end. They hold each other as they come out of nightmares, they fight to build a life that is their own, they struggle every day to disentangle themselves from the things that would define and doom them. They cling to each other, and to the little nest of loveliness that they’ve managed to build. And that’s really what matters, in the end.

\---

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some notes:
> 
> 1\. I wanted to play around with the idea of what would stay constant about Rey/Kylo if they were deposited into a different universe/scenario, and what would change.
> 
> 2\. I was really intrigued by the leaked Trevorrow script of The Duel of the Fates and wanted to stick with Rey being truly a nobody, born of nobody parents, and Kylo being involved in the murder of her parents. (Trevorrow’s script is also where I got the last name Solana.)
> 
> 3\. I never really intended to explain the cause behind the weird memory-dreams; just thought it would be cool to incorporate them as a way of guiding Rey and Kylo’s feelings toward one another. Maybe the Force is still a thing in the modern day, but is weakened/not as directly tangible? Maybe Rey and Kylo are still a dyad in the Force, but because the Force is different, the connection between Rey and Kylo manifests differently?
> 
> 4\. I’ve been thinking recently about how underrated forgiveness is these days. Of course, the perpetrator needs to recognize their wrongdoing and be penitent to deserve forgiveness, and even then it can be difficult for someone who’s experienced pain/trauma as a result of someone else’s actions to forgive them. And it’s certainly not anyone’s place to dictate who should forgive who. But we seem to live in a culture where granting forgiveness is seen as illogical, even a sign of weakness, and I’m not sure that that is a way of living that brings anyone much joy in the end. 
> 
> 5\. (On that note) Thank you for reading up to this point!! I hope you enjoyed reading as much as I enjoyed writing! Please comment w/your thoughts!

**Author's Note:**

> * does a shameless plug dance *
> 
>   * [pressed down, shaken together, running over](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22797028/chapters/54479338) \- modern day AU where Rey and Kylo work at the same company - introspective, slightly dramatic, focus on character development (COMPLETE)
>   * [furball](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23119837/chapters/55319881) \- modern day, casual magic AU where Kylo has a run-in with a small brown cat and things spiral from there - lighthearted, fluffy, short (COMPLETE)
>   * [the black swan](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23474413/chapters/56279338) \- modern day, sci-fi AU based on the movie _Pacific Rim_ \- dark, plot-heavy, equal parts action and introspection/relational development (COMPLETE)
>   * [borrowed sunlight](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26686939/chapters/65093515) \- vaguely historical fantasy/mythological AU based on the Chinese myth _The Cowherd and the Weaver Girl_ \- fluffy and romantic, a little awkward, sometimes a little dark. Beware: science is thrown to the wind! (COMPLETE)
>   * [when i look at you](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27169441/chapters/66356758) \- Harry Potter AU where Rey and Ben meet during their school years, and then again a few years later - dark and angsty (COMPLETE)
>   * [exultant](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29406645/chapters/72242856) \- 1950s AU with a chronically lying, burgling Rey whose employment by Kylo Ren proves to be life-changing - dark, psychological, suspenseful
> 



End file.
